MSRTC goods transport earns revenue of ₹101.93 crore in two years

Mumbai: Despite a dip in ridership owing to the pandemic, the transport of goods by Maharashtra State Road Transport Corporation (MSRTC) has earned them a revenue of ₹101

Mumbai: Despite a dip in ridership owing to the pandemic, the transport of goods by Maharashtra State Road Transport Corporation (MSRTC) has earned them a revenue of ₹101.93 crore in the last two years.

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In May 2020, MSRTC started the initiative of transporting goods, which officials said has turned out to be a new source of profitable revenue.

Till date, MSRTC has transported mangoes, fertilisers, food grains, seeds, sugar, vegetables, construction material, industrial goods, oils, solar equipment, cement, non-hazardous chemicals, automobile parts, books and many more. This facility is available all day throughout Maharashtra.

The corporation converted around 1,124 passenger buses into goods transport carriages, and more than 8 metric tonnes of cargo have been transported in the last two years. “There has been a large number of cement and books that have been transported in the last two years through this goods transport service. If the passenger revenue is compared to the goods revenue, it is not a huge increase. However, this is a great beginning for our goods transport initiative, it is developing to be a new source of revenue which is profitable. The passenger revenue remains our main source of income although it is not profitable,” said Shekhar Channe, managing director, MSRTC.

MSRTC has been incurring losses during the pandemic; passenger ridership has gone down to 26 lakh from the pre covid 66 lakh daily ridership across the state. The earlier revenue of ₹22 crore that was earned each day by the state transport through passengers has now gone down to ₹12 crore per day. In order to support the goods transport initiative and help in revenue, the state government has asked various departments to give at least 25% of the goods transport orders to MSRTC.