NEW DELHI: The country’s third non-government railway line will come up between Indore in Madhya Pradesh and Manmad in Maharashtra linking Jawaharlal Nehru Port Trust, India’s largest container port. The ministries of railways and shipping, Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh governments on Tuesday signed an MoU for Rs 8,600 crore paving the way for execution of the project by Indian Port Rail Corporation Limited (IPRCL), a special vehicle of shipping ministry, in the next six years.

The 362-kilometre-long single-track rail corridor will complete a missing link and reduce the distance by approximately 200km between Indore and JNPT. The new line will be primarily used for running of cargo trains and only two passenger trains will be allowed to use the route.

Currently, containers and other rail traffic from Indore and other locations in central India follow a circuitous route through Vadodara and Surat to reach Mumbai, Pune and ports like JNPT, travelling a distance of 815km. The straight connectivity will reduce travel time and lower logistics costs, shipping minister Nitin Gadkari said. He added that the project passing through backward regions is estimated to result in cumulative net economic benefits of Rs 15,000 crore in the first 10 years of operations.

The new railway line will pass through the Delhi-Mumbai Industrial Corridor nodes of Igatpuri, Nashik and Sinnar, Pune and Khed, and Dhule and Nardana. The project will reduce the logistics cost for the cargo centres located in Northern India such as Lucknow, Agra, Gwalior and Kanpur belt as well as Indore – Dhule – Bhopal region to the gateway ports JNPT and Mumbai.

A joint venture company will be formed between shipping ministry or JNPT, which will be the main promoter, with equity share of 55%. Government of Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh will have equity share of 15% each.

Sources said the revenue generated from movement of cargo trains would be shared between railways and the company that will operate the railway line.

