Statute Law Repeals - Law Commission - Ministry of Justice

3.5 In 1858 the British Crown assumed direct governance of British India. 5 From
1868 onwards, either by the surrender of railway undertakings under the terms of
the previous guarantees, or by direct investment and construction, the
government of India embarked upon development of the railway network as a
form of state enterprise. 6 Management of the system - with its multiplicity of
reporting lines - became increasingly complex. Following a formal review, under
Sir Thomas Robertson, a new Railway Board was formed in 1905. The railway
companies were now, in the main, simply operating companies, running the
network on behalf of the government of India. By 1920 the government owned
almost three-quarters of the total railway mileage in India. This was
nationalisation effected piecemeal. Nationalisation proper started in 1925
(following publication of the Acworth Report in 1921) when the state took over
management of the East Indian and Great Indian Peninsula Railways. From 1929
to 1944 the bulk of the Indian railway network had been nationalised.
3.6 When Pakistan and India secured their independence from the UK in 1947,
acquiring the status of Dominions, 7 the railway system had to be divided. In 1948
a grouped Indian Railways was formed, and the railway network as a whole
(including those systems within the princely states) was nationalised in 1950 as
Indian National Railways. 8 In Pakistan, by contrast, the inherited Railway Board
was dismantled, and rail operation became a part of central government (through
the then Ministry of Communications). This model survived until 1962 with the
revival of a Railway Board and, subsequently, the creation of the state-owned
Pakistan Railways. East Pakistan became the separate state of Bangladesh in
1972, and the state-owned railways are now operated by Bangladesh Railways.
3.7 The combination of gradual nationalisation and acquisition of state independence
means that the individual railway companies have all now disappeared, and the
UK legislation required for their formation and running has long been superseded.
As a consequence, the 38 Acts relating to the various railway companies (and
now recited in the draft Bill), spanning nearly a century of railway endeavour, are
recommended for repeal as obsolete.
5 See the Government of India Act 1858 (21 & 22 Vict. c.106), which gave significant
executive powers to the Imperial government’s newly created Secretary of State in Council
of India.
6 See also the Indian Railway Companies Act 1868 (31 & 32 Vict. c.26), which enabled
seven named railway companies in India (each having contracts with the East India
Company or the Secretary of State in Council of India in respect of their railway
undertakings) to raise moneys by the issue of debenture stock. The Calcutta and South-
Eastern Railway was the first undertaking to be transferred to the Indian government in
1868.
7 Under the Indian Independence Act 1947 (10 & 11 Geo.6 c.30) India and Pakistan both
achieved independence on 15 August 1947 although Pakistan’s independence ceremony
took place first, on 14 August. The new state of Pakistan comprised the territories of West
Pakistan and East Pakistan (the latter now the state of Bangladesh).
8 The nationalised system was grouped in six zones (1950-55), eight zones (1955-66), and
then nine zones (1966). In 2010 Indian Railways operated in 17 zones. In 2007 Indian
Railways put in place in Mumbai its first major upgrade of passenger rolling stock since
1925, although the new stock still has to cater for “super-dense crush load” at commuting
peak hours: article in The Times, 13 November 2007 at p34.
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