South Western Railway profits soar,leads country in revenue earning

Bangalore, Dec 29 (UNI) The South Western Railways (SWR) has taken the number one slot among all the zonal railways in terms of revenue earning and passenger amenities, registering an impressive profit growth of over 34 per cent till November this year against the national average of 15.79 per cent, SWR General manager T N Perti informed here today.

Speaking to newsmen after inaugurating the new service of SMS enabled platform vending machines and computerised car parking machines here today, he said the nascent SWR had registered impressive growth both in Passenger and freight handling.

Mr Perti said the Zone earned a revenue of Rs 441 Crore till November end as against Rs 375 crore last year through passenger and Rs 1644 crore against Rs 1192 crore in freight handling than the corresponding previous year. Earnings through non passenger and non-fright services also increased from Rs 16.18 crore to Rs 21.80 crore. These services including handling of parcels and other related subsidiary services, he said.

He said a number of developmental works were being undertaken in the zone. They included doubling works of Bangalore-Tumkur, Bangalore-Ramnagaram, Bangalore-Kolar and Bangalore-Jolarpet. The much delayed gauge conversion between Bijapur and Gadag was expected to be completed by June 2007 and the state government had released its share of over Rs 110 crore so far with only Rs nine crore was pending.

He also said that the Bangalore-Mangalore passenger train services were expected to commence from next year once the Commissioner of Railways Safety completed inspection between the 50-km stretch Sakleshpur-Subramanya section. ''From our side, all basic works have been completed but the work was delayed for three months due to unprecedented land-slides in the section during the last monsoon period''. The freight services was being operated on experimental bases in the Bangalore-Mangalore section, he said.

Mr Perti added that the gauge conversion work between Mysore-Chamarajanagar, and Bhagalkot-Gadag was expected to complete next year. On thenew line between Satyamangalam and Chamarajanagar, Mr Perti said because of environmental issues, the Tamil Nadu government had not permitted the proposal while Hubli-Ankola had received the clearance of the Union Ministry of Environment and Forests.

He informed that the SWR has plans for a new terminal at Byappanahalli and an additional platform at both Cantonment and City Railway stations in Bangalore. There are also plans to link Kadur with Chikmagalur. The SWR was requested the Railway authorities to sanction additional trains between Hubli-Mysore, Kerala and Tamil Nadu from Bangalore.

The SWR also has plans to spend over Rs 16 crore for improving passenger amenities and additional value added services, he added.

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