Railways register over 8% rise in earnings

With barely weeks to go before the presentation of the Railway Budget, the Ministry today said it has registered over eight per cent increase in earnings at Rs 70,501 crore during the ongoing financial year ending January 31.

"The growth was 8.56 per cent between April 1, 2009 to January 31, 2010 as Railways earned Rs 70,501.65 crore in comparison to Rs 64,943.32 crore it earned during the same period last year," said a senior Railway Ministry official.

The Budget which will be presented on February 24 is likely to focus on increased public-private partnership to expend railway network and seek increased fund allocation for expediting ongoing railway infrastructure projects.

The official said the total goods earnings went up from Rs 44,035.66 crore to Rs 47,763.29 crore during this period while the passenger earnings also went up from Rs 18,057.41 crore to Rs 19,393.26 crore.

Consequently, the growth in goods earnings was registered at 8.47 per cent while the growth registered in passenger earnings was at 7.40 per cent, he said.

Railways carried 6,188.78 million passengers during the 10-month period as against 5,917.13 million it carried during the same period last year, which was also an increase of 4.59 per cent, he said.