Bhubaneswar: The East Coast Railway (ECoR) has shattered all records in freight loading to emerge as the most profitable zone of the Indian Railways in 2020-21 financial year.
By loading 205 million tonne (MT) of freight from April 1, 2020 to March 31, 2021, ECoR became the first zonal railway to cross the milestone of 200 MT of loading for the second consecutive year. It also broke the previous record of 202.56 MT achieved by erstwhile South Eastern Railway in 2002-03. The ECoR also surpassed the target of 203.02 MT set by the Railway Board for the financial year.
The three divisions of the ECoR contributed greatly to achieve the feat. While Khurda Road division bettered its target of 127.02 MT by achieving 131.37 MT, Sambalpur division loaded 12.37 MT of freight.
With an operating ratio of 47.71%, the zone has emerged as the most profitable zone of the Indian Railways. Operating ratio is the term used to determine the profitability. For every rupee earned by the zone, it has to spend 0.47 paisa.
During 2020-21 financial year, the ECoR carried 112.46MT of Coal, 29.49 MT of iron ore, 18.23 MT of iron & steel, 7.62 MT of raw materials for steel plants, 6.18 MT of fertilizer, 3.14 MT of container, 2.76 MT of food grains, 2.91 MT of petroleum products and 22.09 MT of other commodities.
It loaded 42.9 rakes per day from Talcher, 21.1 rakes from Paradeep, 14.1 rakes from Dhamra, 11.7 rakes in KK Line, 16.5 rakes from steel plants, 7 rakes of aluminum during the period.
The zone loaded 16.62% of the total loading by the Indian Railways, according to an ECoR release.
