The Railways plan to electrify sidings without insisting on the mandatory 14 per cent rate of return on investment. The Rail Budget is likely to announce a policy to this effect aimed at saving Rs 1,000 crore (Rs 10 billion).

Sidings are tracks that branch out from main lines, taking wagons for final unloading.

The plan focuses on improving the efficiency of the sidings and maximum utilisation of their capacity as well. It will also help free wagons from carrying more load.

At present, many of these sidings are on diesel traction. The wagons therefore spend a lot of time to change from electric traction to diesel, which leads to pile-ups at junctions.

Railway ministry sources have indicated that there are about 100-200 such sidings that would be electrified at a cost of Rs 200-300 crore (Rs 2-3 billion), if such a policy decision came through. The ministry is working out a proposal analysing the cost-benefit equation of this proposed move.

The officials said ideally, detention time for wagons would be reduced to 24 hours.

According to ministry data, nearly a fourth of a total 561 rakes take more than 30 hours to load at various stations in India and about 13 per cent are detained for more than 40 hours.

Worse is the case of unloading with 33 per cent of a total 564 rakes being detained for more than 30 hours and 14 per cent for more than 40 hours.