Union Finance Minister Piyush Goyal proposed a capital expenditure of ₹1,58,658 crore for the Railways Ministry for the year 2019-20 in the Interim Budget. This is the highest-ever allocation for the national transporter, surpassing last year’s allocation of ₹1,48,528 crore.
Mr. Goyal, who is also the Railways Minister, added that the operating ratio of Indian Railways is expected to improve to 95% in 2019-20 from 96.2% in 2018-19, and 98.4% in 2017-18.
Operating ratio
The operating ratio is expected to improve from 98.4% in 2017-18 to 96.2% in 2018-19 (RE) and further to 95% in 2019-20 (BE),” the Minister said while presenting the Interim Budget.
An operating ratio of 95% means that railways is spending 95 paise to earn 100 paise.
Under the proposed outlay, ₹7,255 crore had been allocated for construction of new lines, ₹4,100 crore for road safety works (building road over/under bridges), ₹10,120 crore for track renewal, ₹3,422.57 for passenger amenities, ₹700 crore for doubling, ₹6,114.82 crore for rolling stock, ₹1,750 crore for signalling and telecom and ₹2,200 crore for gauge conversion. This means that passengers can expect better amenities, newer trains and coaches in the coming year.
The total outlay for 2019-20 comprises ₹64,587 crore from budgetary support, ₹10,500 crore from internal resources and ₹83,571 crore from extra-budgetary resources. In revised estimates 2018-19, the capital expenditure was ₹1,38,857.52 crore, comprising ₹53,060 crore from budgetary support, ₹6,500 crore from internal resources and ₹79,297.52 crore from extra-budgetary resources.
The budget estimates under revenue for the year 2019-20 (gross) is ₹2,72,705.68 crore, recording an increase of ₹22,854.67 crore over the revised estimates of ₹2,49,851.01 crore for 2018-19.
As per the Budget documents, the government expects railway earnings from passengers to grow to ₹56,000 crore from ₹52,000 crore in 2018-19, and from goods to grow by more than ₹10,000 crore to ₹1,31,565 crore.
The Hindu
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