The Indian Railways is known to be struggling for a few years now. It has been called a loss-making unit of the Indian public sector and there have been many debates regarding its complete privatization. Yet, one cannot deny, India’s railway network is widespread and holds a lot of importance, comfort, and ease of travelling for the people of the nation.
Loss-making?
It has actually been found that Indian Railways has made a whopping amount of money which is more than the allotted budget of three north-east states. Indian Railways has made an amount of around Rs 35000 crores which is more than the combined annual budget of Sikkim which gets around 7,000 crores alloted, Mizoram which gets around 9,000 crores allotted, and Manipur which gets 13,000 crores allotted.
Are we absolutely sure?
Yes, it has been found in a report by Jitendra Surana, a senior journalist and activist who used the legal way via the right to information to facilitate the finding of this report of the railways.
According to this report, the amount has been earned over a period of 10 years by selling off scraps like coaches, wagons and rail tracks.
For example, in 2011-12, Indian railways earned profits of around Rs 4400 crore. The report also suggested that rail tracks sales generated the most revenue for the department, around 1/3rd of the total sales, Rs 11938 crores to be precise.
Things are looking good!
This year, just the NFR or the Northeastern Frontier region has made around Rs 84 crores from the sale of scraps, especially only at the start of the year, working rapidly towards their goal of making the region scrap free! For the whole department, the lowest income annually from scrap sale was Rs 2,718 crore in 2016-17.
Another point of interest is how the Indian railways are trying to reduce and fight against the travelers without-the-ticket. They have levied hefty fines and collected Rs 100 crores from April to September 2019 from such travellers.
Things are looking good for our precious and legacy department of the Indian economy. In addition, new launches and initiatives like Tejas Express make us proud and hopeful for a better future.
