Advisory says that investment in Indian Railways to increase by 3-5 times

In an interactive session, Girish Pillai, Advisor-Infrastructure, Indian Railways, highlighted key features of the Indian Railways’ five-year action plan.

Pillai said the National Transport Development Policy Committee has estimated investment till 2032 to be worth Rs. 32,00,000 crores.

“We need to increase the investment 3-5 times,” he added.

Indian Railways aim to increase the share of freight carried on its network from about 30 percent to 50 percent, as is the case in countries like the US, China and Russia.

He also added that 65 percent of trains in India are dedicated to passenger movement, which yield less than 30 percent in terms of revenue for the railways, while 35 percent of freight trains provide the network 70 percent of its revenues.

Talking about capacity creation, Pillai added Indian Railways is facing bigger challenges like capacity creation. He pointed out that traffic and passenger volumes have almost doubled in the last 10 years.

Highlighting the major areas of focus, he stated that Indian railways would need additional 20,000 track kilometres in the next five years, have to double the progress of electrification of tracks (10,000 km) and introduce train set technologies.