The Indian Railways has released an official statement mentioning its overall revenue at the end of August 2022 jumping 38% to Rs 95,486.58 crore. This shows a mammoth increase of Rs 26,271.29 crore vs the corresponding period of last year, the official statement said on Sunday.?
The revenue from passenger traffic was Rs 25,276.54 crore, which is an increase of Rs 13,574.44 crore (116%) year-on-year. This news comes nearly a week after it was reported that the Railway Board is considering a reduction in employees¡¯ allowances amid rising workforce costs.
The Railways said the passenger traffic also increased compared to last year in both the segments, i.e. reserved and unreserved. The growth from the long-distance reserved mail express trains has been sharper than the same in passenger and suburban trains, as per PTI.
The other coaching revenue stood at Rs 2,437.42 crore, higher by Rs 811.82 crore (50%) over the corresponding period of last year. This is being fuelled by robust growth in the parcel segment of Indian Railways, the statement added.?Goods revenue climbed by Rs 10,780.03 crore (or 20%) to Rs 65,505.02 crore till August-end this year.
This has been achieved through incremental loading of more than 58 MT and 18% growth in the net tonne-kilometres (NTKMs) during the period. Food grains, fertiliser, cement, mineral oil, container traffic and balance other goods segments have been important contributors in this growth, in addition to the coal transportation, the report mentioned.
The sundry revenue was Rs 2,267.60 crore, showing an increase of Rs 1105 crore or 95% over the corresponding period of last year, it added.?The railways' total revenue during the entire last fiscal (2021-22) stood at Rs 1,91,278.29 crore.
Last week, sources as per a PTI report indicated that worrisome days might be ahead for railway employees as the Railway Board has asked its seven zones to review their expenditure on employee allowances for overtime, night duty and travel, and fuel and maintenance.
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In a quarterly review meeting chaired by Railway Board Chairman V K Tripathi, it was found out that the Ordinary Working Expenses (OWE) in the current financial year up to May 2022 show that the seven zones have exceeded the Railways' average of 26% increase over the corresponding period of the previous year, they said.
These zones are Northeast Frontier Railway (37.9%), Northern Railway (35.3%), South Central Railway (34.8%), South West Railway (33.1%), North West Railway (29%), Western Railway (28%) and North Central Railway (27.3%).
The report also mentioned that during the meeting, the Railway Board instructed the zones to take "immediate action" to curtail their expenditure and asked the general managers to make an action plan, the sources said. They added "Controllable expenditure like OT (overtime), NDA (night duty allowance), KMA (kilometreage allowance) should be monitored very closely," the Railway Board has told the general managers.
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