Setting a new precedent: Rajya Sabha MPs to pay for rail tickets if booked but not availed

New Delhi: In such times of slump hitting almost every sector of economic growth, the Rajya Sabha is setting a new precedent or rather showing the way to fellow lawmakers and their contemporary in states.

Rajya Sabha Secretariat has issued an advisory to the house members that it will no longer pay or compensate for their train ticket fares if the journey is not availed by them.

‘Cancel tickets or pay for your ticket fare’

The Upper House members will now have to pay the fares for train journeys which they booked but did not undertake.

RS Secretary General Desh Deepak Verma in an advisory to MPs has asked them to cancel unused train bookings, failing which recoveries will be made from them.

“Members are requested to cancel all such bookings which are not likely to be utilised, well in advance. In case of non-cancellation of bookings which are not actually utilised by members, the amount of fare of such bookings shall be recovered from the members,” the advisory said.

Secretariat to pay 85% extra for journeys not undertaken

According to sources, the Rajya Sabha Secretariat has done an analysis of the number of bookings made and actual journeys undertaken by some sitting and former members of the upper house after Chairman M Venkaiah Naidu desired to know the extent of multiple bookings and its implications.

This revealed that Rajya Sabha Secretariat is being asked by the Railways to “pay huge amounts” for journeys not performed by the sitting and former members due to such multiple bookings.

The sources said that a former member of Rajya Sabha made as many as 63 bookings of up to 4 per day on 23 days in January 2019 costing a total of Rs 1,69,005 and confirmed having travelled by train only on seven occasions for a total train fare of only Rs 22,085.

“This means that Rajya Sabha Secretariat has to pay an extra amount of Rs 1,46,920 which comes to about 87 per cent of the total amount claimed by the Railways on account of bookings made by the former member Rajya Sabha during the month of January 2019,” a source said.

The sources said that for the calendar year 2019, the Railways have raised a demand for a payment of Rs 7.8 from Rajya Sabha Secretariat as one-third share of the total cost of train travel by the sitting and former members of Parliament, their spouses and companions. The remaining t two-third of the total cost is to be paid by the Lok Sabha Secretariat.