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Southern Railway was allocated a total budget of ₹7,426 crore for 2018-19. This is a significant increase from ₹3,728 crore last fiscal.
Of the total budget, Tamil Nadu allocation has been increased to ₹2,548 crore, up 11 per cent from ₹2,287 crore last year.
New projects
Addressing media persons today, Southern Railway General Manager RK Kulshrestha said new projects such as the Shoranur-Eranakulum third line, improving passenger amenities, and redevelopment of stations have been sanctioned funds in the current budget.
Around ₹1,518 crore has been sanctioned for the third line in the Shoranur-Ernakulum route and ₹1,684 crore for passenger amenities like reconstruction of station building in Nagapattinam, provision of foot overbridges and high-level platforms in stations, and escalator provisions and redevelopment of stations.
Electrification projects in major cities such as Chennai, Madurai, Coimbatore, and Thiruvananthapuram have been completed and the Erode-Karur-Tiruchi will be completed by March.
Three more electrification projects Madurai-Vanchi Maniyachi-Tuticorin, Vanchi Maniyachi-Tirunelveli-Nagercoil and Trivandrum Central-Kanyakumari will be completed in three years time.
“The completion of these projects will the much needed boost for development of South Tamil Nadu and Kerala,” Kulshrestha said.
With dual electrification, stations such as Nagercoil, Kanyakumari, Rameshwaram and Tuticorin will be developed, he added.
Train connecting Chennai and Kollam via Sengottai will be commissioned shortly and will depart from the newly developed Tambaram depot. With the budget of ₹1,800 crore, the Southern Railway will also take on special works like fitting CCTV cameras in 43,889 coaches of Superfast/Express and passenger trains and surveillance system in 1,109 stations.
Earnings
Southern Railway recorded originating earnings of ₹5,624 crore during between April and December 2017 as opposed to ₹5,517 crore for the same period in 2016. Passenger earnings increased from ₹3,006 crore in 2016-17 to ₹3,184 crore in 2017-18.
The Railway added 2,060 extra coaches facilitating additional passenger movement of 1.05 lakh.
In the event of the recent bus strike, the Railways ran additional services resulting in 13.4 lakh more passengers travelling.
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