Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications
Friday, May 20, 2005
Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications Friday, May 20, 2005 |
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Logistics
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Railways Railways to form SPV for dedicated freight corridor Our Bureau
The Minister for Railways, Mr Lalu Prasad, and the Deputy Chairman of the Planning Commission, Mr Montek Singh Ahluwalia, at a conference in the Capital on Thursday. — Kamal Narang
New Delhi , May 19 THE Government on Thursday formally announced that the Railways, along with the Planning Commission, would form an organisational structure or SPV (special project vehicle) to construct a dedicated rail freight corridor along the Golden Quadrilateral. Initially, it would raise about Rs 22,000 crore as soft loan from Japan for constructing the tracks between Delhi and Mumbai (Rs 12,000 crore); and Delhi and Kolkata (Rs 10,000 crore). During his recent visit to India, the Japanese Prime Minister, Mr Junichiro Koizumi, had expressed the Japanese Government's interest in examining the scope of the project. The Railway Board Chairman, Mr R.K. Singh, and the Planning Commission Deputy Chairman, Mr Montek Singh Ahluwalia, would follow up with the Japanese Authorities for tying up the funds. "Passenger and freight trains move on the same tracks today. A dedicated freight corridor would greatly decongest the traffic," said Mr Ahluwalia. Following the new wagon investment scheme and allowing private companies to set up sidings, the Railways has received investment proposals of over Rs 130 crore for investing in 600 wagons and several new sidings, said the Union Railway Minister, Mr Lalu Prasad. "The Railways would prepare a policy for opening containerised operations to private parties with the Planning Commission within about 1.5-2 months," said Mr Singh. Additionally, private parties would also be allowed to run flat wagons for container movement through wagon investment scheme. On the issue of setting up a tariff regulatory authority, the Railways would prepare a paper on tariff setting mechanism. "We have not got any firm decision from the Railways. "They will find ways of rationalising. One idea is to have an automatic indexing of the fare with fuel price rise," said Mr Ahluwalia. Public private partnership would be encouraged in areas including rail side warehouses, running of tourist and goods trains between two specific points, leasing of additional space in premium trains for carrying parcels, Rail Land Development Authority. For the dedicated freight corridor, the pre feasibility study would be done by July 31, preliminary engineering-cum-traffic survey report by November 2005 and approval of the competent authority will be obtained by February 2006,said Mr Singh. "The project is likely to be completed in next five years," he said. "Having achieved operating ratio of 91.1 per cent in 2004-05 that is best ever in eight years, the Railways aims to achieve an operating ratio of 85 in 2005-06.
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