Indian PM laments unruly coalition

India's premier blamed his unruly coalition Monday for difficulties in passing economic reforms as he reacted to the resignation of a railway minister over a proposed hike in train fares.

"The difficult decisions we have to make (in ushering in economic reforms) are made even more difficult because we are a coalition government," Prime Minister Manmohan Singh told parliament.

"We have to formulate policy with the need to maintain consensus," the 79-year-old premier from the Congress party added. "This was sharply brought out in presentation of the railway budget."

Railways Minister Dinesh Trivedi resigned over the weekend after facing a mutiny in his Trinamool Congress Party, a minority party in the coalition whose leader Mamata Banerjee blasted the proposed hike in rates as "anti-poor."

The prime minister told parliament he accepted "with regret the departure" of Trivedi.

He noted that the minister -- in office since May 2011 -- had promised to carry out a "modernising" vision for the railways laid out by Banerjee, who served as the previous rail minister.

Singh appealed to fractious coalition allies to back reforms to spur growth of Asia's third-largest economy.

"This is an occasion we must eschew narrow partisan ends and stand united as a nation," Singh said.

Banerjee's Trinamool Congress Party is an increasingly unreliable government ally, which sank plans last year to allow foreign supermarkets into India.

The storm over raising rail fares is the latest in a series of embarrassing internal policy disputes that have paralysed the government's liberalisation programme.

The government in its main budget last week steered clear of contentious "big bang" economic liberalisation measures in what it conceded was a deliberate move to ensure it won parliamentary passage.

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