Mahendra Pratap Mall, CMD of Indian Railway Catering and Tourism Corporation (IRCTC), in an interview to CNBC-TV18, said the company will restart 'Tejas' trains once passenger demand returns.

“We have taken these trains on lease from Railways, so there is an annual custody charges of Rs 7 crore and there is a fixed haulage of Rs 7 crore which in any case we have to pay. In addition to that there is a variable haulage of Rs 10 lakh per day. So we break-even at an occupancy level of 68-69 percent,” he said.

On passenger traffic, he said, during Pre-COVID period the company was doing 9 lakh tickets a day, out of which 25 percent was waiting and currently it is doing 4.6 lakh tickets on average a day.

Speaking about catering business, Mall said, “Zomato and Swiggy are serving the kind of food that we serve and they have almost reached the pre-COVID level. So there may be a temporary setback but I am sure that it will come back.”

For entire interview, watch video

(Edited by : Bivekananda Biswas)

First Published:Dec 7, 2020 4:15 PM IST