E-Paper
Railway Budget 2005-06: Highlights
Railway Budget 2005-06: Highlights
Sparing all classes of passengers from any fare hike and goods from an across-the-board freight and parcel rates increase, Railway Minister Lalu Prasad Yadav on February 26 sought to present a populist Railway Budget for 2005-06 proposing sops for farmers, milk producers, unemployed youth and rural students.
However, in a bid to rationalise goods tariff, he has proposed merging of various classes of commodities to bring them down from 4,000 to 80 due to which freight on many goods may go up and on some it may come down. He did not spell out revenue implications of this move.
To ensure that freight rate on kerosene and LPG does not go up, the classes of the two commodities have been reduced due to which the freight on them will get reduced by 3.7 per cent and 2.7 per cent respectively.
The Railway Budget pegged the Plan outlay for 2005-06 at Rs 11,827 crore with a budgetary support of Rs 4,718 crore for plan expenditure through internal resource generation.
Taking into account the outlay of Rs 3,522 crore on safety-related works, the total outlay comes to Rs 15,349 crores, an increase of Rs 851 crore over last year's outlay.
Enthused by the trend of buoyancy of freight loading in 2004-05, the Railways are expecting to carry 635 million tonne of revenue earning originating freight traffic during the coming year, which is 35 million tonne more than the current year's traffic likely to be lifted.
The current year's target has been revised from 580 to 600 million tonne.
* No increase in passenger fares
* No across-the-board increase in freight rates
* No increase in parcel rates
* Earnings record 8.3% growth at Rs 33,900 crore upto Dec 2004
* Revised earnings for 2005-06 at Rs 46,635 crore
* 46 new trains to be introduced in 2005-06
* New scheme to be introduced to encourage public-private partnership in procurement of wagons
* Freight growth surpasses economic growth and 10th plan
* Increase in frequency of 10 trains next fiscal
* 75 per cent concession in II class fares to govt, rural school students once in a year for study tour
* 75 per cent concession in II class to girls from rural areas for appearing in exams like medical, engineering
* 50 per cent concession in II class to farmers and milk producers for travelling for agriculture practices
* Full concession to unemployed youth in II class appearing for interviews for government jobs
* Booking of tickets from landline phones to start soon
* Clean Train Station System to be implemented in 2005-06
* Railways to adopt corrosion resistance stainless steel EMU coaches in Mumbai
* 12 new concrete sleeper plants to be set up
* About 1,400 km of broad gauge lines likely to be added this fiscal
* Gauge conversion of nine sections aggregating 935 km targeted for next fiscal
* Electrification of five sections aggregating 350 km targeted for next fiscal
* Proposal to complete 219 km of new lines on six sections
