India’s Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs, chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, on Wednesday, has approved two Railway projects with over ₹6,400 crore.

These projects include Koderma – Barkakana Doubling (133 km), a section of which passes through coal producing areas of Jharkhand. Furthermore, it serves as the shortest and more efficient rail link between Patna and Ranchi. 

In case of the Ballari – Chikjajur Doubling (185 km) project, it will cover the Ballari and Chitradurga districts of Karnataka and the Anantapur district of Andhra Pradesh. The line will also enhance connectivity to the Mangaluru Port.

According to Ashwini Vaishnaw, Minister of Railways and Information and Broadcasting, the increased line capacity will significantly enhance mobility, resulting in improved operational efficiency and service reliability for the national transporter.

These multi-tracking proposals are poised to streamline operations and alleviate congestion.

According to him, the projects covering seven districts across the States of Jharkhand, Karnataka and Andhra Pradesh, will increase the existing network of the Railways by about 318 km.

The approved multi-tracking project will enhance connectivity to over 1,400 villages and impact nearly 29 lakh population.

Vaishnaw further explained that the multi-tracking, will also boost transportation of commodities such as coal, iron ore, finished steel, cement, fertilizers, agriculture commodities, and petroleum products etc

“The capacity augmentation works will result in additional freight traffic of nearly 49 million tonnes per annum (mtpa) – in one of the projects it generate additional freight traffic of 30 mtpa and in the second around 19 mtpa ,” he said adding that these new lines will “minimise logistics cost” and reduce oil import (52 crore litres), apart from leafing to lower CO2 emissions (264 crore kg).

Both the projects have a completion deadline of three years.

Published on June 11, 2025