The problem of passenger ticket wait list will be over once the three multi-modal economic corridors announced in the interim Budget on Thursday are constructed in another five years, Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said. In the budget proposals for 2024-25, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced the three new major economic railway corridor programmes: energy, mineral and cement corridors; port connectivity corridors; and high-traffic density corridors.
Speaking to mediapersons in New Delhi on budget announcements, Vaishnaw said 40,000 km rail tracks will be laid as part of these corridors which will enhance the the network capacity to a point that the problem of ticket wait list will be over by around 2030-31.
According to Vaishnaw, the budget announcements have laid a big focus on creating additional capacity through these three corridors.
He said these will be multi-model corridors rather than the dedicated freight corridors that only handle freight trains. He also said there are 434 projects in these corridors and they will be implemented at approximately Rs 11 lakh crore.
“First is the energy, metal and cement corridor which will help reduce the pollution on roads and make sure that the cost of logistics comes down. The second is the port connectivity which will provide seamless connectivity to the ports through railways in a multi-mode Gati Shakti way,” Vaishnaw said.
Calling the third corridor “Amrit Chaturbhuj”, the Railway Minister said, “If you look at the shape of our rail network, it is in the form of a quadrilateral and diagonals. This is akin to the golden quadrilateral of highways which is also similar to our railway network. So, Amrit Chaturbhuj will be started on high-density traffic routes.”
“Overall, through these corridors, about 40,000 kms of new tracks will be laid in the next six to eight years. With this, there will be significant increase in the capacity of the Railways. As you know that the Railways is the least polluting mode of transportation and this will further reduce 90 percent of carbon emission,” Vaishnaw added.
He said the rail transport is 40-50 per cent cheaper and hence “in a way, it will bring transformation in our country’s economy, making it more efficient, productive and sustainable”.
Talking about the second announcement regarding the conversion of 40,000 coaches to the Vande Bharat standard, Vaishnaw said the success of Vande Bharat and Amrit Bharat trains has shown the way to the Railways to upgrade all other coaches.
“We have about 40,000 conventional coaches. They can all be upgraded with the experience that we have behind us,” he said.
Vaishnaw emphasised the fact that the focus of the current government is on capacity-enhancement in a big way.
“Last year, the Railways added 5,200 km new tracks which is equivalent to the entire network of Switzerland. This year we are adding 5,500 kms. From 4 km per day in 2014, we are now adding about 15 km per day of the new tracks,” he said.
This is a significant improvement in the way of working and managing networks, he added.
Highlighting that in the current year, the Railways has already achieved 82 percent of its capex budget by the end of January, he said the total budget allocation for 2024-25 is 2.52 lakh-crore which is significant and will help in increasing capacity, improving infrastructure and passenger experience.
