The High Court of Karnataka on Thursday ordered issue of notice to the Indian Railways on a PIL petition, which has questioned the collection of “superfast surcharge” for Malgudi Express plying between Mysuru and Yelahanka in Bengaluru though the train is not operated with the average specified speed.
A Division Bench comprising Chief Justice Abhay Shreeniwas Oka and Justice Hemant Chandangoudar passed the order on the petition filed by Mohammed Dastagir, a resident of Mysuru city. Pointing out that the average speed of the train should be 55 km/hour or more for designating the train as “superfast” express on broad guage line, the petitioner claimed that the train was not moving in the average specified speed even going by the official travel time declared in the railway timetable.
It was stated in the petition that the Railway’s timetable had fixed 3 hours and 35 minutes as the travel time from Mysuru to Yelahanka, and 3 hours and 15 minutes from Yelahanka to Mysuru to cover the distance of 155.8 km between the two points. However, the petitioner said that the travel time in the timetable discloses that the train is actually travelling at an average speed of only 43.81 km/per hour from Mysuru to Yelahanka and 48.31 km/hour from Yelahanka to Mysuru, and not the average speed of 55 km/hour to be qualified as “superfast” express.
Pointing out that a “superfast surcharge” in the range of ₹15 to ₹75 was being levied depending upon on class of travel in the Malgudi Express, which had been designated as “superfast express” with effect from August 15, 2018, the petitioner alleged that levy of “superfast surcharge” was illegal.
Contending that arrival of the train at both end points were delayed, as per the information available on the Railways website, in the range of 10 minutes to 59 minutes during September-November, 2019, the petitioner claimed that this delay had further reduced the average speed of the train, much below than the required 55 km/hour.
