Delhi: The ministry of railways, which did away with concessions for senior citizens in March 2020, will not be restoring them yet, in an attempt to shore up finances — a move that is likely to be unpopular with tens of thousands of older passengers who benefited from the discount before the pandemic.
“Due to challenges posed by Covid-19, total passenger revenue generated during 2020-2021 is less compared to 2019-2020 (pre- Covid period). Cost of granting concessions weighs heavily on railways, hence extending the scope of concessions to all categories of passengers, including senior citizens is not desirable at present,” railway minister Ashwani Vaishnaw stated on Wednesday in a written reply to a question in Parliament.Previously, railways offered 50% discount to female passengers and 40% to male passengers across all classes. The minimum age for availing this was 58 years for women and 60 years for men. The cost of the discount worked out to ₹1,600 crore a year, 80% of the ₹2,000 crore railways incurred on all concessions.
