Following are the prominent highlights of the railway budget for 2012-13 presented in the Lok Sabha on Wednesday by Railway Minister Dinesh Trivedi:
* No steep increase in passenger fares; 2 paise per km for second class on suburban trains and 3 paise per km on mail and express trains; 5 paise per km for sleeper class; 10 paise per km for a/c III tier and first class; 15 paise per km for a/c II tier; 30 paise per km for a/c I.
* Outlay of Rs.60,100 crore during 2012-13, the highest ever.
* Targeting freight carriage of 1,025 million tonnes to bring in Rs.89,339 crore; passenger earnings estimated at Rs.36,073 crore; gross receipts estimated at Rs.1.32 lakh crore.
* New passenger services: 820 new items; 75 new express trains; 21 new passenger trains; 75 new services in Mumbai suburban system.
* Standard of hygiene needs to be improved substantially; all out efforts will be made on this in the next six months; duty bound to provide high standard of services; special housekeeping body to be set up for stations and trains.
* Corrosion from night soil being discharged from toilets on tracks costs Rs.350 crore annually; green toilets to be installed in 2,500 coaches in the next one year.
* Improvement of passenger amenities at a cost of Rs.1,112 crore; regional cuisines to be introduced.
* Two thousand one hundred specially designed coaches manufactured to meet needs of the differently abled; aim to provide one such coach in each express train.
* Focus during next five years on five areas: tracks, bridges, signalling, rolling stock and stations.
* Signalling to be improved over 19,000 km.
* Investment of Rs.1.70 lakh crore on rolling stock in next five years.
* Attempt to increase train speeds to 160 kmph; journey time from New Delhi to Kolkata can be brought down to 14 hours from 17 hours.
* Improvements to railway stations can provide employment to 50,000 people.
* Railways will require Rs.14 lakh crore in the next 10 years for modernisation.
* Aim to bring down operating ratio from 90 per cent to 84.9 per cent in 2012-13 and to 72 per cent by 2016-17.
* Time has come for formulating national policy for railways on the lines of that for defence and external affairs.
* Railways should grow at 10 per cent annually for sustained GDP growth.
* Railways to invest Rs.7.35 lakh crore during 12th Five Year Plan period (2012-17), a quantum jump from the Rs.1.92 lakh crore invested in previous plan period.
* Railways must attract 10 percent of the Rs.20 lakh crore government expects to spend on infrastructure during 12th Plan.
* Railways expect gross budgetary support of Rs.2.5 lakh crore during 12th Plan.
* Collective challenge to formulate viable funding mechanism for modernisation.
* Railways should contribute 2 per cent of GDP from the present 1 per cent.
* Stress on strengthening safety. Has to be be benchmarked with the best in the world.
* Target of reducing accidents from 0.55 to 0.17 has been met.
* Special purpose vehicle to be set up on safety protocols.
* Independent railway safety authority to be set up as statutory safety body.
* Investment of Rs.5.60 lakh crore required for modernisation.
* Independent tariff authority suggested; needs serious debate; experts panel established; decision after debate in parliament.
* Excess of Rs.1,492 crore after meeting expenses/dividend payments not adequate for meeting costs of several projects.
* World Bank funding of Rs.6,500 crore firmed up for dedicated freight corridors; land acquired for 3,300 km; first contracts to be handed out during 2012-13.
* Electrification to be undertaken over 6,500 km at an allocation of Rs.8,000 crore during 12th Plan.
* Conversion from DC to AC power supply completed in Western Railway corridor of Mumbai suburban rail system; conversion of Central Railway corridor to be completed in 2012-13.
* Elevated corridor from Churchgate to Virar in Mumbai being firmed up.
* Government should consider dividend payback to railways.
* Thirty-one projects over 5,000 km being implemented with state govenments sharing costs.
* Capacity augmentation to get Rs.4,410 crore during 2012-13.
* Eighty-five new line projects to be taken up during 2012-13.
* One hundred and fourteen new line surveys to be undertaken during 2012-13.
* New line projects to get Rs.6,870 crore in 2012-13.
* Gauge conversion to be undertaken over 800 km with an allocation of Rs.1,950 crore.
* GRP/RPF personnel deployed on 3,500 trains.
* Free travel by Rajdhani express for Arjuna awardees.
* Dedicated railway design wing at National Institute of Design with a contribution of Rs.10 crore.
* Guru Parikrama trains to be run to Amritsar, Patna and Nanded.