Railways lost over Rs 4,000 cr in 3 yrs by running Mumbai local trains

Mumbai: Amid a major push for expansion of the suburban Mumbai rail network in the Union Budget, the government on Wednesday told Parliament that the national transporter has incurred a loss of more than Rs 4,000 crore by running the Mumbai locals in the last three years.

In a written reply in Lok Sabha on Wednesday, minister of state for railways Raen Gohain said since 2014-2017, railways had incurred a loss of Rs 4280.50 crore by running the suburban rail network in Mumbai.

“Indian Railway is incurring losses by running local train services in metropolitan areas of Mumbai. In the last three years, while the total earnings were Rs 5,206.16 crore, the expenditure was Rs 9,486.66 crore and the loss was of Rs 4,280.50 crore,” Gohain said.

In Budget 2018, finance minister Arun Jaitley announced the expansion of the Mumbai suburban train network, spread over 465 km, at a cost of Rs 11,000 crore, and said the government also planned to allocate an additional Rs 40,000 crore for the city’s rail network.

The suburban railway in Mumbai operates 2,342 local train services and carries more than 7.5 million commuters daily, and this is the first time that the network is being expanded in a big way.

Gohain informed the House that while in 2014-2015, the national transporter lost Rs 1,426.19 crore, the next year, it lost Rs 1,477.55 crore and in 2016-2017, the railways incurred a loss of Rs 1,376.76 crore.