Indian Government fast tracks high-speed rail plan

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The Indian Government is planning to introduce measures to fast track the development of a high-speed rail network in the country.

The push came at a recent meeting where officials decided that development of key infrastructure projects, including high-speed rail must be pushed through and completed on time.

“At the meeting it was also decided that mechanisms will be put in place for regular monitoring and problem solving arises while developing the project. The National High Speed Rail Corporation will be set up soon, which will exclusively deal with aspects like its tendering process and execution,” a Railway official said.

The 492-km long Mumbai-Ahmedabad rail route will be the first bullet train with a speed of 300 km per hour that will cover the distance in two-and-a-half hours rather than current travel time of seven hours.

The government also constituted a Project Steering Group that will meet each fortnight and compile a case for high-speed train projects through the Government of India Enterprise RITES.

The committee will examine the options available for implementing this project and finalising feasible options. It will suggest ways of strengthening the capacity of railways to design and execute high-speed train projects and mechanisms for quickly moving forward on chosen options.

Of the eight high-speed corridors, that will be developed across the country, the government decided to take the Mumbai-Ahmedabad high-speed rail project on the priority basis.

The 492-km long Mumbai-Ahmedabad rail route will be the first bullet train with a speed of 300 km per hour that will cover the distance in two-and-a-half hours rather than current travel time of seven hours.

The other seven high-speed corridors which have got in-principle approval are Pune-Mumbai-Ahmedabad, Hyderabad- Dornakal-Vijayawada-Chennai, Howrah-Haldia, Chennai-Bangalore- Coimbatore-Trivandrum, Delhi-Agra-Lucknow-Allahabad-Patna, Delhi-Chandigarh-Amritsar and Delhi-Jaipur-Ajmer-Jodhpur. 

Except Delhi-Amritsar and Delhi-Jodhpur, pre-feasibility study has been undertaken for all the corridors.

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