In order to boost railway earnings by increasing the proportion of freight loaded by train, a Parliamentary Standing Committee recommended that the Ministry of Railways accelerate the building of new DFCs (dedicated freight corridors) around the nation. In its report, the Standing Committee on Railways, led by C M Ramesh, a member of the BJP Lok Sabha, noted that the average speed of freight trains in 2013–24 was a mere 25.14 km/h.
The Committee is aware that freight loading accounts for the majority of Indian Railways’ revenue. Indian Railways made Rs. 1,68,293 crore from freight traffic in 2023–2024 with a goal of Rs. 1,80,000 crore in 2024–2025. The Committee observed that Indian Railways’ percentage share of the nation’s freight traffic is 26%, according to the report presented to the recently finished Parliament.
Two dedicated freight routes are now being built: the Western Dedicated Freight Corridor, which will connect JNPT (Mumbai) to Dadri (1506 km), and the Eastern Dedicated Freight Corridor, which would connect Ludhiana to Sonnagar (1337 km). The EDFC project is finished, and by December 2025, the 102-kilometer stretch of WDFC that runs from Vaitarna to JNPT should be finished.
According to the railways, the line capacity utilisation over a few specific sections has been eased by the progressive transfer of a tiny percentage of freight traffic from the Indian railway network to the DFC network. According to the railways, the full and anticipated benefits of DFC would only materialize after it was widely implemented.
Three other major corridors—the East Coast Freight Corridor (Kharagpur to Vijaywada), the East West Corridor (Kharagpur and Palghar), and the North South Freight Corridor (Vijaywada to Itarsi)—have already had comprehensive project assessments created by the railroads.
