‘Centre has not received Delhi government’s proposal for free metro rides to women’

New Delhi, June 27 (HS): The Central government on Thursday declined the claims of the Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) led Delhi government  over receiving any proposal demanding free commuting rides for women travellers in Delhi metro.

While replying to an unstarred question asked by Saugata Roy in the Lok Sabha, Minister of State (MoS) for Housing and Urban Affairs, Hardeep Singh Puri in a written reply said that the Centre had not received any proposal allowing women free rides in Delhi metro trains by the state government.

 On another question asking whether the Delhi government had requested and sent any proposal in this regard  to the  Union Government for approval, the Union Minister replied in the negative.

Recently, the AAP government had proposed a scheme allowing free travel rides for women in Delhi metro and buses.

A Delhi government official said that  the ruling state government  had devised a scheme allowing free travel rides to women travelling through modes of  public transport  and the state government would bear all the loss of revenues faced by the DMRC (Delhi Metro Rail Corporation), DTC (Delhi Transport Corporation) and cluster buses due to the implementation of this scheme in the national capital.

The official also said that the state Transport Minister Kailash Gahlot held a meeting with several senior DMRC officials on submitting a proposal  facilitating this scheme and the overall cost  incurred on  its implementation.