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Perhaps for the first time in its 167-year-long history, the Railways has refunded more than it has earned from ticket bookings, registering a negative passenger segment revenue of Rs 1,066 crore in the COVID-19hit first quarter of 2020-21, an RTI query has found.

The freight earnings, however, during the period managed to hold ground, according to the RTI reply provided by the Railways to Chandra Shekhar Gaur, a Madhya Pradesh-based activist.

The first three months of this financial year, when the Railways had to suspend all its regular passenger services due to the coronavirus travel restrictions, the national transporter's revenue was in the negative -- Rs 531.12 crore in April, Rs 145.24 crore in May and Rs 390.6 in June (all in negative), the RTI reply said.

"The minus figures are being shown due to the fact that the value of refunds is more than the value of tickets booked," said Railway spokesperson DJ Narain.

An official explained that due to the suspension of services, tickets booked for travel in April, May and June were offered refunds, while fewer tickets were booked during these three months due to restrictions.

The Railways has cancelled all regular passenger services till further notice.

The Railways has said that due to the pandemic, it is envisaging a loss of around Rs 40,000 crore this financial year.

Meanwhile, as many as 23 companies, including top names like Bombardier, Alstom, Siemens and GMR have shown interest in running private trains in the country and participated in an official pre-application online conference held Wednesday as a prelude to the Request for Qualification.