In 2020, railways proved to be lifeline of the country

New Delhi, Dec 25 The year 2020 proved that Indian Railways is the lifeline of the country as the national transporter played a significant role in transporting lakhs of stranded migrant workers back to their homes and also took up the task of maintaining supply of essential commodities amid the nationwide lockdown triggered due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

The railways also took the maintenance work of its infrastructure amid the lockdown as train operations across the country were very minimal.

According to Railway Ministry officials, in the beginning of the year, the national transporter had started the procedure of merging all cadres into one.

The officials said that the merger was required to do away with department rivalry.

The railways also started the process of allowing private players to run passenger trains and corporatising all production units in 2020, an official said.

After the train services were stopped in the last week of March due to the outbreak of the pandemic, the railways continued to run freight trains which helped maintain the essential supply chain across the country.

The national transporter then started Shramik Special trains from May 1 to transport stranded migrant workers, pilgrims, tourists and students. Following the success of the Special trains, it started 15 pairs of special air-conditioned trains from May 12, followed by 100 pairs of trains from June 1 and 80 more pairs from September 1.

The railways also started runing 20 pairs of clone trains from September 12.

The railways ran over 4,600 Shramik Special trains and ferried over 63 lakh people across the country. However, according to a written reply in Rajya Sabha, 97 passengers died while travelling on Shramik Special trains between May 1 and September 9

Amid the pandemic, railways converted over 5,000 coaches into isolation wards for the Covid-19 patients to meet the extra demand of the beds in remote areas.

On the freight loading front, the railways transported over 834 million tonnes of goods till December.

The national transporter ferried foodgrains, fertilizer, milk, medical equipment, cement, coal, PPE kits and medicines among others transported across the country.

Due to the Covid pandemic and sudden halt of the passenger, mail and express trains, the railways estimates passenger earnings of Rs 15,000 crore in the current fiscal as compared to Rs 53,000 crore in the last financial year.

The railways managed to earn only Rs 4,600 crore in this fiscal from the passenger train operations.

Till now, over 1,089 trains are running for passengers out of the 1,768 trains, besides suburban services operational in Kolkata, Chennai, Mumbai and Delhi regions.

The railways meanwhile, took the opportunity of maintaining its assets including rail bridges and tracks during the lockdown.

A railway ministry official said that the maintenance of the railway assets was much required exercise to strengthen the rail infrastructure for safety of train operations.

The railways this year also offered 109 routes to private players for operating 151 modern trains across the country. The process of the selection of the companies are underway.

The officials said that the private train operations is expected to enhance the passenger operations with customers getting best in-class service at competitive price. The project would entail private sector investment of about Rs 30,000 crore.

The year also witnessed major activities on the Dedicated Freight Corridor front as about 600 km of routes were commissioned with trial runs being operational.

Even Alstom, which entered five years ago with the largest foreign direct investment

( With inputs from IANS )

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