Railway Board seeks to rein in spending on employee allowances, fuel

New Delhi: Concerned over rising working expenses, the Railway Board has asked its 7 zones to review their expenditure on employee allowances for overtime, night duty & travel, and fuel and maintenance, sources said.In a quarterly review meeting chaired by Railway Board Chairman V K Tripathi, it was found that the Ordinary Working Expenses (OWE) in current financial year up to May show that the 7 zones have exceeded the Railways’ average of 26% increase over corresponding period of previous year, they said.

These zones are Northeast Frontier Railway (37.9%), Northern Railway (35.3%), South Central Railway (34.8%), South West Railway (33.1%), North West Railway (29%), Western Railway (28%) and North Central Railway (27.3%). In a reply to a query, the Railways said the total working expenses for Budget Estimate 2022-23 is Rs 2.32 lakh crore. As accounts are yet to be audited, the corresponding final figures are only provisional, it said.“The Railways has issued guidelines on expenditure control and management as circulated by the Ministry of Finance. Austerity and economy measures are being implemented on various fronts. Also, we are optimising fuel consumption and focussing on improvement in inventory management,” it said. During the meeting, the Railway Board instructed the zones to take “immediate action” to curtail their expenditure and asked the general managers to make an action plan, the sources said. “Controllable expenditure like OT (overtime), NDA (night duty allowance), KMA (kilometreage allowance) should be monitored very closely,” the Railway Board has told the general managers.