Railways has registered record revenue figures of ₹2.40 lakh crore for the financial year 2022-23, up 25% or ₹49,000 crore from the previous year, the railways ministry has said.
Freight revenue, too, leapfrogged to ₹1.62 lakh crore, a growth of nearly 15% on the previous year. Railways’ passenger revenue also registered an all-time high growth of 61% to reach ₹63,300 crore.
After three years, Railways has been able to fully meet the pension expenditures. The ministry has attributed buoyancy in revenues and tight expenditure management to an operating ratio of 98.14%, well within its target. After meeting all revenue expenditures, railways has generated ₹3,200 crore for capital investment from its internal resources (₹700 cr for Depreciation Reserve Fund, ₹1,000 crore for DF and ₹1,516.72 cr for Rashtriya Rail Sanraksha Kosh)
In terms of traffic revenue, railways earned ₹63,300 crore as passenger revenue in 2022-23 as compared to ₹39,214 crore in 2021-22, up 61% year-on-year.
Railways earned ₹5,951 crore as other coaching revenue in 2022-23, up 21% YoY; ₹8,440 crore as sundries revenue, up 39%; ₹2,39,803 crore as gross revenue, up from ₹1,91,278 crore in the previous financial ear; ₹2,39,892 crore as railway receipts as compared to ₹1,91,367 crore in 2021-22; and ₹2,37,375 crore as railway expenditure, up ₹2,06,391 crore in the year-ago period.
Besides, ₹1 lakh crore was invested in augmenting the capacity of the railway network. The year FY23 also saw the “highest-ever commissioning of new lines” and “doubling/multi-tracking” of 5,243 KMs, according to the railways.
In addition to that, around 6,565 km of tracks were electrified with the investment of ₹6,657 crore, propelling Railways towards achieving the goal of 100% electrification in the current fiscal.
Railways says it is focused on providing safety highest priority. “An investment of ₹11,800 crore under Rashtriya Rail Sanrakhsa Kosh was made during FY23 for various safety works.
Also, the Centre, says the ministry, is proliferating Vande Bharat in the system. “Wagon procurement jumped by 77.6% over the previous year to 22,747 wagons. Modern Rolling stock of ₹44,291 Cr was procured for better passenger comfort and for augmenting Railways' loading capacity.”
Minister of railways, communications and electronics & information technology, Ashwini Vaishnaw, while replying to a question in the Lok Sabha last month, had talked about initiatives being taken for effective and speedy implementation of rail projects. These, he said, include setting up of Gati Shakti Directorate in the ministry and Gati Shakti Units in divisions; prioritisation of projects; a substantial increase in allocation of funds on priority projects; delegation of powers at the field level; close monitoring of projects at various levels, regular follow up with states for expeditious land acquisition.
