Railways to focus more on freight services to increase revenue

Aurangabad, Sept 18:

Railways will now focus more on freight services rather than passenger transport as it loses 48 paise behind every rupee behind passenger trains. Aurangabad being the industrial city, it is the best destination for freight corridor and efforts will be seeded up for the dedicated freight corridor, said union Minister of State for Railways, Coal and Mines Raosaheb Danve. He was speaking at the interaction meet organised by the team of associations in the city on Saturday.

Speaking further Danve said, the work of 7 dedicated freight corridors is underway. I have planned to set up an 8th corridor that will be a high speed bullet train between Mumbai-Nagpur travelling at a speed of 350 km per hour and will only take two to two and half hours to travel between Mumbai to Aurangabad. This project will not only boost the transportation services, but also be beneficial for the industrial sector. The state needs to provide 38 per cent land connected to Samruddhi expressway for the project. The Center and the state government had earmarked Rs one lakh crore for the state's stalled railway projects by setting up a Maharail Corporation. But with the state stopping funding, all the projects are in trouble. No matter how much money is given by the centre, it will not work without the share of the state. MLAs Atul Save, Haribhau Bagade, CMIA president Shivprasad Jaju, CII chairman Raman Ajgaonkar, AurangabadFirst president Pritish Chatterjee, Massia vice president Kiran Jagtap, Vyapari Mahasangh president Jagannath Kale, state president of the Laghu Udyog Bharti Ravi Vaidya, entrepreneurs Ram Bhogale, Ashish Garde, Rishi Bagla, Satish Lonikar and others were present.

Dry port to be functional this year

A total of Rs 350 crore is being spent on the dry port of Jalna. The process of expanding railway tracks up to dry port is underway. The issue of land acquisition at two places has been resolved. A company will be appointed for the handling of the dry port and it will be functional this year, he said.

Give my word to CM

I give my word to Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray that if he takes initiative for the Mumbai-Nagpur bullet train, the Central government will stand strongly with him at every step, because this project is our dream. The first bullet train project in the country will link Mumbai with Ahmedabad, he said, and added that instead, we should focus more on Mumbai and Nagpur bullet train.

Pune to Ahmednagar railway line

The demand for Aurangabad-Pune railway line is not feasible as it will take 11 to 12 hours to travel to Pune from the city by train. Instead, Pune to Nagar railway line will not only speed up the transportation but will also be convenient for the passengers.