The Railways earned Rs 6,512.04 crore by carrying 133.17 million-tonne of freight during the first quarter of the current fiscal, 1.94 per cent higher than what it earned in the corresponding period last fiscal.
The freight load for the period overshot the internal target of 130.1 million-tonne and is 9.76 million-tonne higher than the freight load during April-June 2002.
The first quarter earnings are 23.4 per cent of the budgeted target of Rs 27,850 crore for 2003-04. Senior railway officials told Business Standard that the performance could be attributed to the freight rate rationalisation that had been undertaken over the past two years.
Other factors that contributed to the good performance were revival of the steel sector in the economy and higher generation of thermal power in the country. Even though the monsoons have been good this year, reservoirs take time to fill up and till then coal would continue to be used for generating electricity.
Officials said coal transportation accounted for 44 per cent of the total earnings in the quarter. The total accrual from coal cargo is Rs 2,870.17 crore, which is 5.50 per cent higher than the earnings from the corresponding period last year. Transportation of raw materials to steel plants and movement of the finished product contributed Rs 588.69 crore or 9 per cent to the railways' kitty.
The revenue from steel has gone up by 11 per cent from last year. The railways earnings from foodgrains and cement loading have also gone up compared to the same period last year, even though there has been a dip in earnings from fertiliser and petroleum-oil-lubricants cargo.
Rationalisation of freight rates, announced in Rail Budget 2002, had resulted in a jump in cargo traffic by 26 million-tonne last fiscal.
However, the loading was heavy during the later months of the fiscal. The freight load target of 540 million-tonne for the current year is 22 million-tonne higher than that realised in 2002-03.
