Freight target miss in FY24 set to dent Railways' ambitious growth plan

Grappling with capacity concerns, this is the first post-pandemic Budget where the railways will miss its targets set at the beginning of the financial year

A Rs 10,000-crore cut in the revised estimates (RE) of freight earnings of the railways in the interim Budget means that the railways may see a goods revenue growth of only 0.28 per cent against its FY24 Budget estimates (BE), denting its ambitious near-term goals.

Against the revised estimates (RE) for FY24, the national transporter envisages a 6.51 per cent increase in its goods revenue at Rs 1.8 trillion.

Since the onset of the pandemic, the railways either outdid its budget targets or met them in the revised estimates. This had fuelled hopes of a long-pending major modal shift in