Chennai: Indian Railway's, the country's biggest landlord, has plans to mine revenue out of its land holdings. The organisation plans to lease out some of vacant pieces of railway land lying near certain railway stations for construction of hotels or guesthouses. The railway ministry is in process of identifying surplus land at 100 sites. These will be allotted for public-private partnership (PPP) projects through open tenders through a "two packet bidding system" consisting of a technical and a financial bid.

Meanwhile there has been a marked all-round improvement in the performance of Indian Railways during April-October 2006.

The loading has gone up from 366.92 MT in April-October 2005 to 403.33 MT in April-October 2006. Freight earnings have gone up from Rs20,060.06 crore in April-October 2005 to Rs22,779.05 crore in April-October 2006. Passenger earnings have also gone up from Rs8,561.00 crore in April-October 2005 to Rs9,675.96 crore in April-October 2006.

Railways accidents too have come down from 140 during the corresponding period last year to 136 this year.

The Integral Coach Factory (ICF) produced 661 coaches during the period April-October 2006 exceeding the target by 10 coaches while Rail Wheel Factory (RWF) produced 76,835 wheels and 31,141 axles during April-October 2006 compared to the target of 75,453 wheels and 29,607 axles.

Chitranjan Locomotive Works (CLW), Diesel Locomotive Works (DLW) and Rail Coach Factory (RCF) produced 78 electric locos, 108 locos and 746 coaches respectively equaling the target.

According to the ministry, the target for acquisition of diesel locomotives in the 10th Plan was for 444 locomotives. There has, however, been a sharp increase in traffic and the likely acquisition to meet traffic demand has been pegged at 619 diesel locomotives, out of which 469 had been manufactured till 31st March 2006. The remaining 150 diesel will be manufactured during 2006-07.

The ordinary working expenses during April-October 2006 have come down by Rs342.43 crore from the budget provision of Rs.22,336.59 crore to Rs.21,994.16 crore (actuals). The working expenses for the month of October 2006 have also come down by Rs448.61 crore from the budget provision of Rs.2,911.75 crore to Rs2,463.14 crore (actuals).

The punctuality percentage of mail and express trains during April-October 2006 in broad gauge and meter gauge respectively was 92.4 and 97.7 compared to 92.0 and 97.4 during the same period last year.