Indian Railway Budget 2010

Feb 24: Mamata Banerjee concluded her two-hour long presentation of Railway Budget 2010 by delivering a good news to the country that the Railways doesn't find it necessary to hike the passenger fares. Railway Minister Mamata Banerjee on Wednesday presented Railway Budget for the next fiscal with the promise of a new business model to encourage private investment along with social commitment but without privatisation.

Speech highlights:

• First rail line in Andaman and Nicobar Islands to connect Port Blair to Diglipur, farthest town of North Andamans.

• Railways to have master plan for North Eastern region.

• Railways to run a special train to Bangladesh on the 150th birth centenary of Rabindranath Tagore.

• Net profit of Rs.1,328 crore in 2009-10

• 10 automobile ancillary hubs to be created

• Twenty-two million energy saving CFLs for lighting distributed already

• Policy decision to employ one member of family whose land is requisitioned for railway projects

• North-south, east-west dedicated freight corridors to be created

• Construction of high-speed passenger rail corridors envisaged

• More multi-functional hospitals to be set up

• Educational facilities to be set up for children of 80,000 women families

• Special facilities to be established for gangmen

• Insurance facilities for licensed porters as part of railway's corporate social responsibility

• Centre for railway research to be established with Indian Institutes of Technology and Defence Research and Development Organisation

• Will involve unions in policy making

• Integral Coach Factory Chennai to be further modernised

• New wagon repair shop in Mumbai

• Design, development and testing centre for railway wheels at Bangalore

• Rs 1,302 crore provided for passenger amenities in the 2010-11 Budget against Rs 923 crore last year.

• Allocation for construction of new lines increased from Rs 2848 crore to Rs 4411 crore.

• Gross traffic receipt for 2010-11 pegged at Rs 94,765 crore.

• Freight loading target for 2010-11 fixed at 944 million tonnes, 54 million tonnes more than the current year's revised target.

• Connectivity is key to India's growth.

• Time has come for the business firms to join hands with railways.

• Railways to come out with 10-year plan 'Vision 2020'

• Railways open for public private partnership model in projects.

• Need to make policies investment friendly; investments proposals should be cleared within 100 days

• Special task force will be set up clear business projects within 100 days.

• New anti-collision devices, better traffic signaling systems along 880 kms of track.

• Out of 17,000 unmanned crossings 13,000 will be manned within five years to avoid accidents.

• Railway plans to have e-ticketing mobile vans at hospitals, universities.

• Railways to come up with multilayer parking space through PPP (public private partnership).

• Cheap drinking water will be provided at all the stations, plans to open six bottling plants.

• Railways to come with a special drive to have better amenities.

• 117 trains will be flagged off within seven months.

• 1000 kms of rail lines to be completed in one year.

• We want to strengthen Railway Protection Force (RPF) but law and order is a state subject. We have very few RPF personnel. RPF is not sufficient of taking care of the security.

• Railways proposes to set up five sports academies at Delhi, Secunderabad, Chennai, Kolkata and Mumbai.