This comes as IR posted its worst operating ratio (money spent to earn every Rs 100) in 16 years, at 96.9 in 2016-17.
Hit by Covid waves and slowdown, the Indian Railways has still not been able to return to its pre-pandemic passenger traffic, data by ministry of Railways has revealed. In February, the national transporter received 413 million ticket bookings - 43 per cent higher than the previous year, but only 61 per cent of the 675 million in February 2020. According to the statistics, that was the last time the Railways saw more than 500 million bookings in a single month.
The Lok Sabha was adjourned twice in the post-lunch period on Thursday as a war of words broke out between the treasury and opposition benches, triggered by Congress MP Charanjit Singh Channi's spat with the Bharatiya Janata Party's Ravneet Singh Bittu.
The 1.4% decline projected for 2025 is driven by a 5.6% (72,000) dip in the strength of railway employees to 1.2 million by next year.
Attacking the government for a provision of a mere Rs 500 (Rs 5 billion).
As the finance minister rises in the House to present the Budget, some interesting facts about the annual financial plan for the country.
Indian Railways plans Rs 39,000 crores non-fare revenue. Via: Branding of trains. Vinyl-wrapping of Rajdhanis, Shatabdis and Garib Raths. Moving billboards.
Ask rediffGURU and PF expert Nitin Narkhede your mutual fund and personal finance-related questions.
Railway Budget will be presented on February 26.
Prabhu's maiden Railway budget is high on vision.
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The development comes after the National Democratic Alliance government this year broke a 92-year-old tradition of presenting a separate Railway Budget, according to suggestions made by the Debroy committee.
The Rajya Sabha approved 15 legislations during the session while the Lok Sabha passed 23 bills, including the GST bills.
The Modi government's flagship initiative 'Make in India' launched 10 years ago has helped the country boost exports, push investments and promote manufacturing. Under the initiative, launched on September 25, 2014, a series of measures have been taken by the government to boost local manufacturing. These initiatives include the rollout of production linked incentive (PLI) schemes for 14 sectors, easing foreign direct investment (FDI) norms, reducing compliance burden to improve business climate, all approvals through single window, and rolling out of the national logistics policy.
We have merely continued with the reforms we had undertaken last year. Nothing has been done with an eye on elections.
Nirmala Sitharaman on Wednesday assumed charge as the Finance and Corporate Affairs Minister for the second consecutive term and is slated to soon present the final Budget for FY '25 that is going to set the tone for the Modi 3.0 government's priorities and direction for Viksit Bharat. Upon her reaching the North Block office, Sitharaman was greeted by Finance Secretary T V Somanathan and other top officials. Minister of State for Finance Pankaj Chaudhary was also present. Chaudhary assumed charge on Tuesday evening.
Using lines of a popular Hindi song, "Kya hua tera vaada (what happed to your promises)," Lalu attacked the PM.
Amid FY23 Union Budget's focus on investments, leading domestic credit rating agency Crisil on Wednesday said that the capital expenditure is "not as high as it sounds". It, however, was quick to add that considering that governments usually tend to cut capex during a crisis, the government has maintained its focus on growth-spurring initiatives amid the pandemic. The research wing of the agency said, if one excludes the Rs 1 lakh crore of loans to states for capex included in the headline figure of Rs 7.50 lakh crore or 2.91 per cent, the actual spend in FY23, will go down to 2.58 per cent of GDP, which is barely at par with the revised estimate of FY22.
Expressing commitment to augment the country's infrastructure, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Monday proposed to significantly enhance capital expenditure to Rs 5.54 lakh crore in the next fiscal, besides creating institutional structures and giving a big thrust to monetizing assets to achieve the goals of the National Infrastructure Pipeline (NIP). Sitharaman said NIP, that was launched in December 2019 with 6,835 projects, has now been expanded to 7,400 projects and around 217 projects worth Rs 1.10 lakh crore under some key infrastructure ministries have been completed. "For 2021-22, I propose a sharp increase in capital expenditure and thus have provided Rs 5.54 lakh crores which is 34.5% more than the BE of 2020-21," the finance minister said.
Budget proposals have set four goals to transform Indian Railways.
A united opposition is set to corner the NDA government on issues ranging from the NEET paper leak case to railway safety.
During a five-hour meeting with his entire Council of Ministers, Modi specifically asked for faster and better communication of the government's decisions.
Banerjee wants the two top leaders of the United Progressive Alliance to nudge the Planning Commission into including some of her most important initiatives in the Railway Budget.
Two premium new long-distance trains and plan to convert a strategically important metre gauge line into broad gauge were announced on Wednesday for the Northeastern region in the Railway Budget, but opposition BJP and AGP dubbed the sops as "frustrating".
'Retail investors, who had not seen such a massive correction in the SMID universe since COVID-19, are witnessing something like this for the first time. Panic profit booking may continue.'
The minister of state said the requirement of the ministry was more and resources were limited.
To corner the Manmohan Singh government in the Budget Session of Parliament, a united opposition today demanded a debate on price rise on February 23, before the Railway Budget and the Union Budget are placed in the Lok Sabha.
As per practice a vote-on-account or approval for essential government spending for a limited period is taken in the election year and a full-fledged budget presented by the new government.
CST Mumbai, Pune, Nagpur, Howrah, Sealdah, Thiruvanathapuram, Chennai, Bhopal, Madhura Junction, New Jalpaiguri and Kochi are some of the stations that will be modernised.
Prabhu hoped that during this 3-4 years period, railways would be able to absorb the impact from their resources
Following the Budget being announced by Finance Minister Arun Jaitley, leaders across the political spectrum provided their views.
The Railway Budget has impressed industry watchers.
The forthcoming Budget, the last full one before the 2019 Lok Sabha elections, is expected to contain a number of sops and feel-good announcements, especially regarding social sector schemes.
Presenting the Railway Budget for 2010-11 in the Lok Sabha on Wednesday, Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee said that there will be no hike in freight tariff.
PSU divestment, LIC IPO, fiscal deficit: Budget 2021 marks a clear change in the Modi government's stance from fiscal conservatism to growth orientation.
"Earlier, governments were busy in vote bank appeasement but we are busy satisfying people," the prime minister said.
President Droupadi Murmu on Wednesday emphasised the need to strengthen affirmative action as a tool for inclusion while urging the rejection of divisive tendencies rooted in perceived social hierarchies.
'We need to look beyond the current approach'.
A slew of concessions, including for carriage of foodgrains, kerosene and fertiliser, were announced by Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee in the Railway Budget 2010-11. Cancer patients travelling for treatment would get 100 per cent concession in third AC and sleeper classes.
Budget has already bombed at the box office and passing it without a revisit will be a mockery of the exercise though any modification may be short lived and perfunctory, observes V Ranganathan.
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