GIPE-PUNE-OIIOI2 - DSpace@GIPE

190 THE RAILWAY INDUSTRY AND COMMERCE OF INDIA
companies from the A.B.R. down to the S.I.R. has in
its record of the years 1921-27 the story of diminution
in the rate of expenses and increase in the rate of
earnings, and. of course some of these are state-managed
and others company-managed. In other words, the
actual statistics of the . financial working of the
Indian railways does not point categorically to
any differences between the two systems of
management. Let us scrutinize the figures more
minutely. B.N.W.R. and Nizam R. are the two lines that
exhibit not only the lowest figures in the expenses
columns but the highest figures as well in the earnings.
columns. The first is a thoroughly private company and
the second a guaranteed one. It is, again, in the
company-managed railways like the. A.B.R. and the
S.I.R. that the diminution in the percentage of working
expenses from 93·75 to 53·76 and 72'27 to 54·17 is
specially noticeable, although of course all the lines have
more or less the same kind of achievement to their credit
in this regard. It is not possible to claim anything extraordinary
in behalf of the state railways. The rates of
earnings, again, on the state railways, 3·99 p.c.
(G.I.P.R.), 5·25 p.c. (E.B.R.), 5·65 p.c. (E.I.R., etc,
for the year 1927 do' 1'3ot happen to be much above the
lowest in the schedule. Indeed, the railways which.
exhibit rates considerably above the general average
(namely, 5'47 p.c.) are, strangely enough, all private,
companies. Altogether, then, in regard to the contro-·
versy, state Os. company in :ailway management, Indian
statistics, so far as. they go, do not favour the
statalists In any special manner. Socialism as
embodied In the nationalization of railway~ does.