'We carry 6.5 billion passengers every year. We have crossed seven billion this year, and are targeting 10 billion by 2030.'
If the fiscal deficit target of 4.9% of GDP has to be met for 2024-2025, which the government must in view of the uncertainties and challenges emerging both domestically and globally, the finance ministry may see in the composition of the current year's capex a sliver of hope, notes A K Bhattacharya.
Two passengers were killed and 34 injured when eight coaches of the Chandigarh-Dibrugarh Express derailed near Gonda in Uttar Pradesh on Thursday, an official said.
About a million railway employees participated in the strike ballot of NFIR. In December, 800,000 employees participated in the strike ballot conducted by another leading union, the All India Railwaymen Federation, with 96 per cent voting in favour of a strike.
Railway officials also indicated that possible 'sabotage' and tampering with the electronic interlocking system, which detects the presence of trains, led to the Friday accident.
From highways connecting once-remote regions to aviation networks carrying millions, India's infrastructure story is one of transformation.
rediffGURU Rohit Gupta, co-founder and COO of College Vidya, provides a list of competitive exams that can help you land a job in the public sector.
This alternative is being planned as the existing projects continue to be delayed due to land acquisition troubles. The ministry is thinking of adding new track lines to its existing eastern and western DFCs passing major areas in the proposed stretches, senior officials said.
The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs on Wednesday approved seven multi-tracking projects of Indian Railways at an estimated cost of around Rs 32,500 crore, Union minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said. The proposed projects, which will be fully funded by the Centre, will help increase the existing line capacity, smoothen train operations, reduce congestion and facilitate ease of travelling and transportation. The projects covering 35 districts in nine states -- Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Telangana, Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra, Gujarat, Odisha, Jharkhand and West Bengal -- will increase the existing network of Indian Railways by 2,339 km and provide employment of an estimated 7.06 crore man-days to the people of the states.
'... that it once again shies away from renewing its commitment to strategic divestment,' points out A K Bhattacharya.
The Railway ministry has been allocated budgetary support of Rs 140367.13 crore in the Union Budget on Tuesday - Rs 20,311 crore more than the revised figures of the previous fiscal. Overall, the national transporter is set to get a capital expenditure (CapEx) push of Rs 2.45 lakh crore in the financial year 2022-23, 14 per cent higher than the budgeted capital expenditure of Rs 2.15 lakh crore for the current financial year. Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in her Budget speech for 2022-23 said that India will manufacture 400 new, energy-efficient Vande Bharat trains in the next three years.
As Indian Railways looks to avert the crisis like last summer, preparations are under way to stock up coal at thermal power plants. Much like February and March, thermal coal movement in April was 5 per cent higher than the previous year, data from the Ministry of Railways shows. While India prepares for a hot summer this year, 48.23 million tonnes (mt) of coal for thermal power plants was ferried by Indian Railways in April. The national transporter also moved about 500,000 tonnes--18.4 per cent-- more imported coal for power plants this April than it had done last year.
On this day 167 years ago, the wheels of the first passenger train in the country from Mumbai to Thane started rolling.
The strong message from the prime minister is of continuity of policies he considers right with strong emphasis on execution, points out T N C Rajagopalan.
A scam had come to light in two lesser-known services-- Railway Board Secretariat Service and Railway Board Secretariat Clerical Service -- where promotions were being made allegedly without following due procedures and bypassing Union Cabinet's jurisdiction.
With Trinamool Congress (TMC) chief Mamata Banerjee's landslide victory in West Bengal, the Union railways ministry is set to have a new minister soon and a revamped board.
'Imagine what will happen when a train running at 128 kmph moves onto a track that is meant to have only a speed less than 30 kmph!' 'Naturally, it will derail, and the coaches will go for a tailspin.'
It is for the first time in the history of Independent India that not a single Muslim is part of the Union Cabinet.
Debroy's economic interests and research work covered numerous areas such as economic theory, income inequality, and infrastructure financing.
Union Railways Minister Suresh Prabhu on Wednesday said the Centre was seeking private capital investment in cash-strapped Railways to meet the resource crunch and it does not amount to privatisation as the Railways unions claim.
The change in leadership at the railway ministry comes at a time when the national transporter is grappling with low passenger earnings even as it is trying to increase freight loading and open up its doors to private investment. Union Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw took charge from Piyush Goyal who got the railway portfolio in 2017 after Prime Minister Narendra Modii dropped Suresh Prabhu from the Union Cabinet. Completing freight corridors, negotiating land for the bullet train, and speeding up monetisation plans would be some of the major focus areas for Vaishnaw.
Among the new entrants to the Union cabinet, former Madhya Pradesh chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan has been given the agriculture and rural development portfolios, Bharatiya Janata Party president J P Nadda the health portfolio and former Haryana chief minister Manohar Lal Khattar the power portfolio.
'If you are in a position to give employment to local people, you will find no terror attacks in your area.'
The Commerce and Industry Ministry has circulated a draft Cabinet note for inter-ministerial consultations.
For Yogi Adityanath the successful management of the fair is a crucial part of building 'Brand UP' and making the state a $1 trillion economy.
Railway employees will take a final call on whether to go on a general strike to press for their 36-point charter of demands including jobs for wards of employees on VRS.
The railways ministry has a capex target of Rs 1 lakh crore for the financial year.
Rising energy demand could tilt India's energy basket towards fossil fuels from coal to oil, natural gas.
Passengers, who do not have the app installed on their mobile phones, might be asked to do so after their arrival at the station.
The Delhi high court on Tuesday directed X Corp and Google Inc to remove prima facie defamatory social media posts against Indian Railway Personnel Service (IRPS) officer and Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla's daughter Anjali Birla.
The notification of the Act comes just a day after Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan was asked when the legislation would be implemented. The minister had said the law ministry was framing the rules.
Shah said the Modi government has given highest priority to peace and development in the Northeastern region.
Here is the complete list of ministers in Modi 3.0 and their portfolios:
Key infrastructure sectors -- from railways to power, and from coal to petroleum -- will not only be part of the achievements but promises too, as the BJP fights to get a third term at the Centre.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi has rejigged his team only once, in July 2021, in his second term, unlike in his first stint, when he reshuffled and expanded his council three times.
Signalling both change and continuity, India's new government, headed by Prime Minister Narendra Modi for a third consecutive term, got into work gear on Tuesday with cabinet ministers and ministers of state filing into their respective offices to assume charge.
Talking to PTI Amarjeet Kaur, General Secretary of All India Trade Union Congress (AITUC), said, "The two-day nationwide strike by the joint forum of central trade unions has begun this morning". About the impact of the agitation, she said that the entire coal belt (mining area) is affected in Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh. She also said that there is a good response in industrial areas of Assam, Haryana, Delhi, West Bengal, Telangana, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Karnataka, Bihar, Punjab, Rajasthan, Goa, Andhra Pradesh and Odisha. The AITUC official noted that the banks and insurance sectors are affected all over India, while steel and oil sectors are also seeing partial impact due to the strike. Kaur said that she has got preliminary reports that markets are closed in Odisha.
The Mumbai town planning agency has said it can't spare land in the commercial BKC area for a terminal due to demand from private firms
China evinces interest in the 1,754-km long high-speed rail project.
Concerned over the fallout of the Red Sea crisis and severe shortage of containers against the backdrop of a steep decline in merchandise exports in August, the Union government is pulling out all the stops to find a solution. To begin with, the government has devised a strategy aimed at boosting container supply and supporting exporters.
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