POLICIES ON RAILWAYS INFRASTRUCTURE

Outline of Rail Transport in India

Rail transport is a commonly used mode of longdistance transportation in India. Almost all rail operations in India are handled by a state-owned organisation, Indian Railways, Ministry of Railways. The rail network traverses the length and breadth of the country, covering a total length of 64,015 kilometres It is the 4th largest railway network in the world, transporting over 10 billion passengers and over 1050 million tonnes of freight annually Both passenger and freight traffic has seen steady growth, and as per the 2009 budget presented by the Railway Minister, the Indian Railways carried over 7 billion passengers in 2009

Historical Overview of The Railways

Railways were first introduced to India in 1853 from Bombay to Thane By 1947, the year of India's independence, there were forty-two rail systems. In 1951 the systems were nationalised as one unit, the Indian Railways, becoming one of the largest networks in the world

Growth of Assets in Railways

In 1950-51, the route length was 53,597 km. In 199596 the route length rose to 62,915 km showing an increase of 17.42 % Till 1955-56, the electrified route was just 388 km which increased to 748 km by 1960-61, registering an increase of 92.7 % The conversion of metre and narrow gauges into broad gauge has been an ongoing programme In 1950-55, the number of railway stations in the country was 5,976 which gradually rose to 7,068 in 1995-96

Growth of Traffic in Railways

Freight Traffic Freight traffic has been showing an upward trend though not consistently and has increased to 405.5 million tonnes originating in 1995-96 with an annual average growth rate of 5.38% Passenger Traffic (Suburban) At the beginning of the First Five-Year Plan, suburban passenger traffic on the Indian Railways was 412 million passengers. The suburban traffic over the yeas rose steadily and reached the figure of 2,484 million passengers in 1995-96 Passenger Traffic (non suburban) The traffic resumed upward movement during the first two years of the Sixth Plan with an annual growth rate of 1.67 %. Since then, the number has witnessed wide fluctuations. It rose to 1,533 million passengers originating in 1995-96.

Trends & Analysis

Freight traffic carried in Financial Year 1997-98 was 430 million tons, which is 5.5 % up over the previous year. An annual growth rate of 5 percent has been assumed for the Ninth Five year plan period. (Source: Government of India) With reference to the Fig. Below, we can say that the Indian Railways freight traffic volumes have increased over the years but the railway s share of the total freight movement has reduced drastically.

Policy Initiatives
The main task before the Railways is to augment capacity so as to make a quantum jump particularly in freight traffic The incidence of asset failure (engine failures, hot mix detachments, rail fractures) has to be controlled by providing technology back up to the human element in the area of train operations in order to enhance safety The augmentation of capacity of HDC (high density corridors) and the Golden Quadrilateral should be a prime focus Urgent need to carry out to an exercise to prioritise the projects of new lines & gauge conversion i.e. defer some projects and give a go ahead to some important ones so as to make optimum use of resources

Policy Initiatives (Contd.)

The railways must focus on reducing the speed differentials between freight and passenger services by raising speeds of freight cars to at least 100 km/hr, improving throughput of the whole system It is necessary to improve freight car designs to secure higher pay load to tare ratios for freight Mechanisation of track maintenance is another area which should receive higher priority Introduction of modern signalling and telecom facilities should get a fillip as this would help in augmenting track capacity

Policy Initiatives (Contd.)

In order to promote inter-modal transport for safe, efficient, customer friendly and faster movement of goods, thee is a need to increase Inland Container Depots (ICDs). The establishment of ICDs should take place at the crossings of the three modes of surface transport i.e. rail, road and inland waterways in order to minimise costs and time. Some subsidisation of rail tariff is unavoidable in our situation. However, the extent of subsidisation must be limited to where it is absolutely unavoidable. An improvement in the fare freight ratio (earning per passenger km. vis--vis earning per tonne km.) from the present level of 0.32, which is one of the lowest in the world, to 0.5 as it was in 1951/52, would result in additional earnings of Rs. 4400 crores.

Policy Initiatives (Contd.)

It is also necessary to adopt a system of automatically indexing railway fares (both passenger and freight) to increases in fuel costs and wage costs adjusted for an expected annual productivity increase on both counts In the long term energy and environmental policy interest, tariff for electric traction is required to be streamlined to bring about uniformity in the tariffs charged by various State Electricity Boards

Policy Initiatives (Contd.)

The Railways made a beginning to involve the private sector with the launching of Own Your Wagon Scheme. The scope of Private Sector Participation in acquiring rolling stocks particularly high speed wagons and new generation locos needs to be enlarged gradually through innovative leasing schemes. The railways need to identify projects with a high rate of return for offering to the private sector A Railway Tariff Regulatory Authority should be created to determine Railways Tariffs. An independent authority fixing tariffs keeping in mind the need to prod the Railways to greater efficiency and at the same time ensuring that the cost of providing services is fully recovered is necessary for the development of railways

Future Outlook of Rail Transport

At present, the railway system is a monolithic departmental enterprise which covers provision and maintenance of the track network, operation of freight and passenger services, and also substantial production units. Indian Railways should concentrate on its core function, i.e. running of transport services on commercial lines, white spinning off non-core /peripheral activities, such as manufacturing units, into individual cost and profits centres. These can remain in the public sector for the time being, but should operate like any other public sector unit on commercial accounting principles. Gradually, the private operators may also be allowed to compete in the provision of rail transport services.