Since the year 2017, Railway Budget has been merged with the Union Budget. The NDA government did away with the 92-year-old colonial era practice and made the rail budget a part of general budget. Finance Minister Sitharaman will also highlight the Rail Budget plans for the national transporter as part of the main Budget speech.
Though she is expected to do a tightrope walk balancing the needs of the economy and fiscal constraints in her maiden budget speech, a big infrastructure boost can be expected in the railways sector.
There is expected to be a big push for infrastructure spending including on roads and railways to drive growth which had slowed to a five-year low of 5.8 per cent in the first three months of 2019 - well below China's 6.4 per cent. The slowdown is also reflected in high-frequency numbers such as IIP and automobile sales numbers.
Also, the Rail Budget is likely to focus on passenger safety. Infrastructural development on railway stations, railway tracks and in train compartments, may be given importance in the budget.
In 2018, former Finance Minister Arun Jaitley had announced the largest-ever allocation of Rs 1.48 lakh crore capital expenditure for the Indian Railways in 2018-19.