July 31, 2020: The first Quarter of the current financial year (April-June) has thrown up major challenges for Indian Railways but to make up for the loss in revenue, various innovative measures were taken since the country-wide lockdown began in March, 2020, an official release informed today.
“One of such innovation was to run hundreds of parcel trains, just like passenger trains, with a fixed time-table,” it said, adding these trains have become immensely popular among both long-distance and short-distance transporters for being cost-effective and time-efficient.
The Northeast Frontier Railway (NFR) has operated 355 such parcel trains during May-June alone carrying more than 1.1 lakh quintals of goods, generating Rs 5 crore as revenue, stated the press release issued by NFR’s Chief Public Relations Officer.
This has helped to maintain the supply chain of essentials, food items, dairy products, vegetables etc. during the current pandemic, it said.
Since the beginning of lockdown till July 27, 4541 such parcel trains were run in Indian Railways carrying 2.41 Lakh tonnes of cargo resulting in collection of Rs 87 crore as revenue, it added.
To facilitate customers and increase traffic in such parcel trains all zonal railways have constituted dedicated team of officials called Business Development Unit (BDU), which act as single-window mechanism for small and medium business and industries, the release said.
Indian Railway is now planning to provide End-to-end Logistic Services in parcel business by gradually moving away from leasing of parcel space in trains to private operators with introduction of on-line booking of parcel space in trains of choice (on first- come-first-serve basis) at pre-determined freight rates, it added.
Under this, all Zonal Railways have been asked to identifying stations where dedicated Parcel terminals can be set up by separating parcel traffic from passenger platforms in order to provide space to parcel-handling agencies, for stacking and processing of their cargo.
The Railway Ministry had discussions with major E-commerce players and parcel aggregators on 29th June to formulate policy in this direction, the release said.
Initially, Indian Railway is planning to collaborate with Deptt of Posts for providing end-to-end logistics solutions to parcel customers at 7 locations (Mumbai, Pune, Nagpur, Nasik, Akola, Solapur, & Kolhapur) over Central Railway and gradually expand it to other locations in all-India level, it said.
To provide the first-mile and last-mile connectivity for such parcel traffic, service agents would be appointed and the list of such agencies will be made available online and customers can choose a suitable agency for handing over their parcels, it added.
Meanwhile, the NFR in another release, informed that the Indian Railways on “mission mode” has achieved a significant milestone of pulling freight traffic ahead of last year’s level inspite of COVID-19 related challenges.
On July 27, the freight loading was 3.13 MT which is higher than last year for the same date. The average speed of Freight Trains on July 27, 2020 was also 46.16 kmph which is more than double as compare to last year for the same date (22.52 kmph), it said.
Source: Morung Express
