india

Updated: Aug 07, 2019 23:31 IST

The Union Cabinet has cleared a proposal to increase the maximum speed of trains on the busy New Delhi-Mumbai and New Delhi-Howrah routes to 160kmph from the current 130kmph in order to reduce travel time by at least three and half hours, according to a government statement.

The project, to be executed at an investment of Rs 13,489 crore, is part of the 100-day agenda of the Narendra Modi government in its second term. The move will give boost to Indian Railways’ “Mission Raftaar”, announced in the Railway Budget 2016-17, that envisaged doubling the average speed of freight trains and increasing the maximum speed of all non-suburban passenger trains by 25 kmph in the next 5 years.

An analysis by the Indian Railways showed that only 0.3% of the over 60,000-km railway network is fit to handle trains running at 160kmph while 5% of it can handle the maximum speed of 130kmph.

“The government has given its approval for increasing the speed of the Delhi-Mumbai route (including Kanpur-Lucknow) to 160 Kmph at a total cost of Rs 6,806 crore by 2022-23. This will ensure improved speed, service, safety and create capacity,” read the government statement. By increasing the speeds on these routes, the travel time between Delhi-Howrah and Delhi-Mumbai will be reduced to 12 hours and 10 hours, respectively, as compared to the current 17 hours and 15.5 hours, it said.

The estimated cost to upgrade the speed on the Delhi-Howrah route will be Rs 6,684 crore and the work will be completed by 2022-23, according to railway officials .

The policy also requires removal of all level-crossings which are being done away with under a separate plan head, according to the railways. The government claims that the project will help boost employment during the construction phase with more than 3.6 crore man-days to be generated directly.

The railways is also working to increase train speeds in all the routes of Golden Quadrilateral and Diagonals — Delhi-Mumbai, Delhi-Howrah, Howrah-Chennai, Chennai-Mumbai, Delhi-Chennai and Howrah-Mumbai.