Mumbai, May 25: The Kisan Rails are an initiative to help farmers to send their perishable agro products to inter-state markets without any delay. Western Railway had run the first Kisan Rail on November 24, 2020 between Laxmibai Nagar near Indore and New Guwahati.
Mumbai Central Division made a debut of its first Kisan Rail on January 28, 2021 from Dahanu Road station to Adarsh Nagar station in Delhi, by kick starting chikoo traffic after 16 years, and now it has reached the century mark. This achievement has been possible with constant monitoring and motivation by Alok Kansal, General Manager of Western Railway. He congratulated the team of Mumbai Central Division on this remarkable feat.
According to a press release issued by Sumit Thakur- Chief Public Relations Officer of Western Rly, the Kisan rails are benefitting all sections of farming community from Dahanu, Gholvad region in State of Maharashtra & Valsad, Udvada, Chikhli, Navsari, Amalsad region in State of Gujarat. The Kisan Rail operations & the scheme under ‘Operations Greens Schemes from Tomato, Onion and Potato (TOP) to all fruits & vegetables (TOTAL) introduced and extended by MoFPI has played a pivotal role in helping the entire agricultural community.
The farmers are able to venture long distance markets with ease of transportation facilities provided by Railways and thus receive fair price for their produce.
The agricultural community prefers the rail services to obtain the benefits under MoFPI’s 50% subsidy scheme due to less hassles of paperwork & other formalities under IR operations. Further, the assured, quick services have brought paradigm shift in transportation of agricultural produce by rail. Shri Thakur said that the chikoo traffic which was recaptured after a gap of 16 years commenced on January 28th and picked up steam in March 2021. The cumulative revenue through this traffic is Rs 7.6 Cr.
Thakur further added that Railways undertook integrated steps to get the traffic of chikoo on board. Amalsad station was opened for handling goods traffic.
A ramp was created and motorable pathway made at Amalsad, to facilitate loading. Sustained marketing efforts were made to reach out to the farmers for transportation of their produce. Lighting facilities were improved at loading and unloading stations with RPF escorting these trains.
The produce was transported mainly from Amalsad & Dahanu Rd to Adarsh Nagar in Delhi. Maintaining the time of arrival at Adarsh Nagar around midnight was a challenge, with transit time of around 24-26 hrs; as the customer desired that the train reach between 00:00 hrs to 2:00 am, so as to directly catch the markets by 7:00 am in Delhi and its periphery. Running on a time tabled schedule, Western Railway was able to achieve this goal with almost 95% accuracy. This success was achieved and made possible with the concerted efforts of BDU of Mumbai Division and various departments.
