new delhi congress has barred its organisational officebearers who are members of parliament from seeking travel allowance from the party in what is an interesting part of austerity measures put in place to counter fund crunchthe austerity guidelines say general secretariesstate incharges who are mps are requested to desist from claiming travel allowance from aicc while party officebearers have for long been reimbursed for the trips they undertake as part of organisational work the singling out of mps among them indicates that congress believes they can manage on their own many felt the directive indicates that mps should make do with the travel allowance that they receive as parliamentarians as reported by toi congress wants its office bearers to desist from air travel and prefer train journey now the guidelines have made it clear that the directive on train journey is for aicc secretaries who have been asked by congress chief rahul gandhi to travel at least 1520 days a month in the states they have been assigned which is set to incur heavy expenditurethe secretaries should travel up to 1400 km by train for which they will be reimbursed and for distances above 1400 km aicc would provide them with lowest air fare that too twice a month only if the train fare is more than the air fare then they can travel by flightthe austerity measures gain prominence in the wake of reports that congress is faced with serious paucity of resources and the drain on funds would increase with coming polls to states and the lok sabha in 2019 congress has also asked aicc office bearers to regulate expenses on canteen stationary and computer accessories