Southern Railway Mazdoor Union sees move to privatise Chennai-Madurai Tejas Express, warns of protests

COIMBATORE: Two weeks after the government handed over the New Delhi-Lucknow Tejas Express train to private players to run, railways employees are protesting what they call the move to privatise the Chennai-Madurai Tejas Express. They say a Chennai-Coimbatore express train is also on the list.
The Southern Railway Mazdoor Union conducted a meeting here on Wednesday and threatened the government of massive protests and struggles if it went ahead with the plan to privatise these two trains in Tamil Nadu.
Speaking at the meeting, Southern Railway Mazdoor Union general secretary N Kanniah said the Narendra Modi-led government planned to privatise two express trains in every zone “which are running with full percentage and earning good profits”.
“If this happens, private companies will remove 53% concession that the government gives on tickets, with extra concession on senior citizens. So, people will start having to pay double the fare. And like airlines, they want to adopt dynamic pricing, which will make last minute tickets as expensive as flights,” he said.
They also protested the idea to privatise the modern coach factory in Rae Bareilly, stating that it would make coaches manufacturing more expensive. “The facility which now produces coaches at a cost of Rs 2.5 crore, will start producing them at Rs 6 crore after privatisation,” he added.