Kolkata: Around 5 lakh passengers rode Kolkata Metro’s Blue Line (Dakshineswar to New Garia) every day in FY 25-26 against the Green Line’s (Howrah Maidan-Sector V) 1.5 lakh per day. Among the shorter corridors, the Purple Line (Joka-Majerhat) saw about 5,000 commuters daily, the Yellow Line (Noapara-Airport) around 3,000 and the Orange Line (New Garia-Metropoliton) around 2,000.The city’s rapid transit network, staring at a 190% operating ratio (metro spent Rs 190 to earn Rs 100) against last year’s 221%, is hoping to gain more commuters in the 2026-27 fiscal.Total ridership for the city’s 74-km metro grid stood at 23.6 crore for last fiscal, with the Blue Line accounting for a majority of the commuters at 17.9 crore. However, the Blue Line’s ridership fell by a crore from the 18.9 crore passengers it recorded in FY 2024-25 to the FY 2023-24 level. Metro officials blamed the suspension of services at Kavi Subhash (New Garia) station — the southern terminal of the city’s lifeline cutting across the north-south axis — for the drop in numbers. The station was shut after one of its platforms developed cracks, and is now being razed to make way for restoration.Since July 22, 2025, the second-last station of the corridor, Shahid Khudiram, has been functioning as the southern terminal. Till last month, this station did not have a rake-reversal facility. This impacted operations and forced many passengers to opt for other modes of transport.Metro Railway is now looking to substantially improve ridership in the current fiscal, with new general manager Prem Sagar Gupta monitoring operations. “The GM is meeting officials on a regular basis to get the Kavi Subhash terminal functional at the earliest,” an official said.The jump in ridership for the Green Line, or East-West Metro, from 2.7 crore in FY 24-25 to 5.2 crore passengers in FY 25-26 is due to the linking of the 2.4-km Esplanade-Sealdah section that has made the entire 16-km corridor from Sector V to Howrah Maidan under the river Hooghly operational.Officials said ridership figures also reveal great potential for the Purple Line, which now runs 8 km from Joka to Majerhat five days a week. The corridor, which recorded a total passenger count of 15.3 lakh in FY 25-26, will eventually link Joka with Esplanade and extend further south to Diamond Park and north to Eden Gardens.The Yellow Line carried a total of 13.6 lakh passengers in FY 2025-26. This 7-km corridor linking Noapara with Dum Dum airport was, however, commissioned only in Sept 2025.The least traversed metro was the Orange Line (8.2 lakh riders), which lost much of its viability after the shutdownof Blue Line’s Kavi Subhash station, its interchange with the north-south corridor. Officials said the Orange Line’s ridership will improve when it reaches Sector V, now that the Chingrighata hurdle has been crossed.
