Patna: Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar on Wednesday expressed disappointment with the Railway Budget calling it an "empty box".
"There is nothing in the Rail Budget worth commenting on ... The issue of railway safety has been spoken in future tense and the speech by Railway Minister Dinesh Trivedi merely speaks about safety measures to be taken in future," he told reporters here.
Kumar, himself a Railway Minister during the NDA rule, recalled that the ministry during his tenure had set up a corporate safety fund and a corporate safety plan for a ten-year period of 2003-13.
"The incumbent railway minister (Lalu Prasad) chose to keep quite on the corporate safety plan because the UPA government at the Centre did not pay attention to the safety issue, as a result of which the number of railway accidents have increased over the years.
"The UPA government did not care for railway safety for the better part of its term. But as it comes near the end of its term it has again started talking about safety measures, but in future tense," he said.
He said the railway budget presented today "simply does not give hope for improvement to the commuters".
"The fact that the Railway Minister spoke for nearly two hours on the 2012-13 railway budget was an indication that he did not propose to do much on the ground," he added.
PTI
First Published: Wednesday, March 14, 2012, 18:02