NEW DELHI: As the Narendra Modi government proceeds with the grandiose plans for a Bullet Train between Mumbai and Ahmedabad, a RTI query has revealed that over 40 per cent of seats on all the trains on this sector go vacant causing huge losses to Western Railway.
According to RTI replies received by Mumbai activist Anil Galgali, only in the past one quarter, the Western Railway’s staggering losses on this sector is nearly Rs 30 crore (Rs. 29.91 crore), or around Rs. 10 crore per month.
“The Indian government is over-enthusiastic and plans to spend more than Rs 1 lakh crore on the Bullet Train project, but it has not done its homework properly,” Galgali said, adding it raises serious question marks on the viability of the Bullet Train project, whenever it comes up.
The Indian Railways have also admitted that they have no plans to introduce any new trains on this sector which is already in the red.
Replying to Galgali’s query on seats occupancy on all the trains between the two cities, the WR revealed that in the past three months, 40 percent all seats went vacant on the Mumbai-Ahmedabad sector and 44 percent empty on the Ahmedabad-Mumbai route.
WR’s Chief Commercial Manager Manjeet Singh said that between July 1-September 30, there are 32 mail/express serving this sector with a total seating capacity of 735,630 seats on the Mumbai-Ahmedabad sector.
IANS inputs