VIJAYAWADA: South Central Railway (SCR) has set a record by loading the highest amount of freight in the financial year 2018-19, in the entire zone. It reached the mark of 122.51 million tonnes (MTs), breaking last year’s record of loading 116.80 MTs. So far this year, the zone’s incremental loading has been 19.47 MTs, the best of the Indian Railways, and also the highest incremental loading the SCR has ever achieved. It has also surpassed the target set by the Railway Board by 10 per cent.
Due to this, the Zone has earned Rs 10,584.94 crore, crossing the Rs 10, 000 crore mark in freight loading for the first time since its inception.Principal Chief Operations Manager N Madhusudhan Rao on Monday said that this feat was achieved thanks to the Operating Department’s efficient coordination with other branches and various strategies the department came up with to increase freight loading. SCR formed an action plan to analyse the requirements of freight customers on a day-to-day basis and took efforts to fulfil them.
This target was achieved despite many traffic blocks being imposed such as elimination of unmanned level crossing gates, electrification of railway lines and track renewal works etc for infrastructure development. Top priority was accorded to safety without compromising on infrastructure development works. Not even a single restriction was imposed on the loading because of route congestion.Wagon holding was just 2.2 per cent higher than the last year, Rao said. The freight traffic record was made also due to a major surge in loading of coal and cement.
The commodity-wise loading contributions to this record freight loading are coal, 67.56 MTs; cement, 28.23MTs; iron ore, 5.46 MTs; food grains, 4.42 MTs and fertilisers, 6 MTS. SCR’s freight basket also includes raw materials to steel plants, 2.89 MTs; containers,1.30 MTs; petroleum products (POL), 0.78 MTs and other goods, 5.91 MTs. Among the freight customers of SCR, M/s Singareni Collieries Company Ltd (SCCL) of Telangana was a major transporter of coal to various destinations.
The Krishnapatnam Port Company Limited (KPCL), Kakinada Sea Port Ltd, located in South Coastal Andhra Pradesh, was another core customer of the SCR. SCR General Manager Gajanan Mallya lauded the efforts of all those responsible for achieving the feat and congratulated the entire team of officials.
Chief Commercial Manager K Siva Prasad, Chief Freight Transportation Manager B Nagya and other senior officials were also present.