Indian Railways announces freight incentive

With an aim to support various segments of the industry and to give a boost to economy, P. S. Mishra, Member (Traffic), Railway Board, announced certain freight incentives to give a boost to the economy. The details on the freight rate related measures announced are as under:
1. Levy of Busy Season Charge Deferred:
• BSC, which is levied @ 15 per cent from October 1 – June 30, has been deferred till further advice (except for iron ore and POL).
• Coal & coke and container traffic are already exempt.
2. Waiver of supplementary charges on mini and two-point rakes:
• The five per cent supplementary charges applicable on loading on mini and two-point rakes is being waived off.
• This is likely to boost loading of smaller cargo sizes and help cement, steel, food grains and fertilizers loading.
3. Round-trip charging on container traffic:
• As per haulage charge rating of container traffic, 0-50 km is the minimum distance slab for charging.
• It is seen that container traffic in this ultra-short lead (0-50 km) is very low at present.
• Therefore, round-trip charging of container trip has been introduced for less than 50 km on each way.
• Under this scheme, haulage charge for 0-100 km slab will be charged for total to and from movement, instead of charging for 0-50 km slab each way.
• Impact- this comes out to be about 35 per cent cheaper per TEU for the complete round-trip
• It is expected to especially give a fillip to ex-im traffic between ports and ICDs.
3. Discount on movement of empty containers and empty flat wagons
• A discount of 25 per cent in haulage charge of containers has been given to encourage movement of empty/flat to ports; thereby increasing loaded container traffic in return
• It is expected to enhance price-competitiveness of Railway vis-a-vis other modes of transport and expand freight basket by capturing new traffic.
4. Large-scale de-notification of commodities for container traffic
• As per container haulage charging policy, notified commodities are charged at Container Class Rates (CCR), which is 15% lower than General Tariff Rates (GTR). Rest of the commodities are charged at Freight All Kind (FAK) rates, which are even lower than CCR.
• Recently, 90 more commodities have been de-notified, which brought down their haulage charge from CCR to FAK rates.
• Now, out of total 635 commodities in Goods Tariff, only 38 commodities are under notified/CCR rates (11 of these are POL commodities).
5. Freight marketing initiatives:
• Induction of more New Modified Goods car rakes and introduction of new design of Bi-level auto car wagons (BCACBM wagons).
• Rationalization of Road Railer with four new weight slabs instead of earlier 3 weight slabs. More competitive rates.
Weight and weighment conditions relaxed in perishable traffic when loaded in goods wagons