Coronavirus outbreak pulls down rail freight traffic to historic low

Data shows freight traffic and earnings are down for the first time in 18 yrs

The Indian Railways saw the first drop in freight traffic in the 18 years for which the data is available as the country went into a nationwide lockdown in March to control the spread of coronavirus.

For 2019-20, freight volume declined 12.7 million tonnes (mt) while earnings from it were down Rs 2,096 crore.

The distress was evident in passenger figures, too. Passenger earnings for 2019-20 contracted marginally by 1.07 per cent to Rs 50,472.20 crore. For the first 20 days of April, the national transporter saw a loss of Rs 463.30 crore in its earnings from passenger services, down 115.49 per