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DIMAPUR — The Indian Railways may soon face bigger challenges as its debt has been on the rise over the last few years. At present, the railway’s debt stands at INR 28,702 crore, an increase of INR 5316 crore from the last fiscal and at an all-time high. According to the Indian Railways, the rise in debt is the result of major investments made in the infrastructure sector to enhance punctuality, speed and safety of the passengers.
As soon as these facilities become operational, the debt burden will lessen with each passing day, it claimed. At the same time, the railways also claimed that it will explore various avenues for more revenue.
It is trying to convey the message that everything is going according to plan and that there is no chance of it falling into a debt trap. But the standing committee on railways is not as optimistic and has expressed concern over the drastic fall in the revenue.
Amid such claims and counter-claims, the people are eager to know the actual state of the railways, often referred to as the lifeline of the nation, as lakhs of Indians are directly or indirectly dependent on it for their livelihoods.
According to experts, the Indian Railways, since its inception, has been faced with some unique problems, which are completely different from other rail networks in the world. Being the largest public sector company in the country, it is burdened with massive social responsibility, apart from contributing to the progress of the nation – a difficult balance that the railways of other nations don’t have to maintain.
[bsa_pro_ad_space id=1]For instance, rail travel is equally as expensive as air travel in some Western countries. Thus, the aviation industry has progressed at a much faster rate than railways, which has virtually reduced it to mere freight carriers rather than passengers in these countries.
But in India, hikes in the passenger fare have always created tremendous hue and cry as a large section of people, mostly belonging to the middle class and lower strata of society commute by train daily for various purposes.
So, the idea of increasing revenue by hiking the fare is not feasible in India. In the past, the Indian Railways would fill the gap between earnings and expenditure by raising freight charges. But as road transport offers cheaper goods options now, the railways are in a quandary about ways to enhance revenue collection.
In such a situation, the real challenge before the Indian Railways is to enhance revenue collection which has declined by 8.20 per cent in recent years.
Although it has stressed that the improvement of rail services in India will become visible in a couple of years, clearly, inadequate funds will delay modernisation plans, which in turn will increase the misery of commuters who are heavily dependent on rail services. So, the Indian Railways needs some out-of-the-box ideas to increase its revenue to keep its wheels moving steadily forward.