Achal Khare, who was appointed as the managing director of High Speed Rail Corporation of India Limited (HSRC) last month, has said in an interview with the Times Of India that the Mumbai-Ahmedabad bullet train project will be completed by December 2023 at an expected cost of Rs 1.10 lakh crore.

According to Khare, ground work in the project has been divided into two parts - construction of training institutes and supporting infrastructure and construction of the rail corridor. The construction of the institute, that is supposed to come up in Gandhinagar, will begin next year and completed in 2020. The construction of the rail corridor is also expected to begin in 2018. However, trial drilling for the construction of an undersea section of the project has already begun.

Khare also stated that only 450-km of the rail corridor will be open for Indian participation. The remaining part of the corridor, which involves installation of sophisticated electrical systems, will be constructed by the Japanese side only.

Railway Ministry and NSRC have signed a tripartite pact with Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) for the development of Mumbai-Ahmedabad high-speed rail corridor. Japan has agreed to fund 80 per cent of the project through a soft loan of Rs 79,000 crore at an interest rate of 0.1 per cent, with a tenure stretching over 50 years and a moratorium period of 15 years.

Also Read: What The Mumbai-Ahmedabad Bullet Train Means For The Region