‘Frequent changes in Railways’ catering policy lead to compromise in food quality’

Frequent changes in the Railways’ catering policy and several discrepancies in the implementation of the existing one have resulted in the food quality, hygiene and cleanliness being compromised, the Public Accounts Committee said in its report presented to the Lok Sabha recently.

The committee, chaired by Congress MP Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, carried out a detailed examination of the Railways’ catering policy and its impact on food services in trains. The report, titled “Catering Service in Indian Railways”, observed that a number of catering activities that were assigned to the Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC) in the 2005 policy and then transferred to the zonal Railways according to the 2010 policy were assigned back to the IRCTC in the 2017 policy.

“... frequent change in catering policy and consequent transfer of responsibility to manage catering units from Railways to IRCTC and back created a state of uncertainty in management of catering services provided to the passengers,” the committee said in its report.

It added that while examining the implementation of the Catering Policy of 2017, several discrepancies were revealed.

Some of those are no provision for a pantry in some long-distance trains, base kitchens located outside Railway premises that results in the food quality, hygiene and cleanliness being compromised, unauthorised vendors on platforms and trains and unfair practices at stations and trains.

According to the 2017 policy, the Railway zones are required to prepare as well as periodically review and update a master plan (blueprint) for food services to be provided at each station and on trains. However, the committee found out that seven zonal Railways -- East Central, Eastern, Northeast Frontier, North Western, South Eastern, South Western and East Coast Railways -- prepared the master plan after an audit pointed it out.

The report said according to the Catering Policy of 2010, gas burners in the pantry cars of trains were required to switch over to electric power equipment to avoid the occurrence of fire accidents.

“In this regard specifically, the committee found that a total of 103 pantry cars were manufactured by Integral Coach Factory during April 2011 to March 2016 at a total cost of Rs 111.94 crore with provision for centralised LPG cylinders with open flames, instead of providing electric power equipment panel counters etc.” the report said.

The Railways has now replaced the ICF coaches with LHB coaches and only LHB pantry cars are being manufactured, which would phase out the ICF pantry cars.

Expressing concern on the quality of food being served on trains, the report said that according to the 2017 policy, the IRCTC was required to set up base kitchens on Railway premises to monitor and control the quality and hygiene of the food being cooked. However, only 16 base kitchens were inside the Railway premises, whereas 115 were located outside the Railway premises and were not subjected to quality checks.

“In the opinion of the committee, since food was being procured by licensees from outside, they were evidently not subjected to regular and constant quality checks and thus, could not register an assurance for quality, hygiene and cleanliness,” the report said.