By TIOL News Service

NEW DELHI, SEP 18, 2024: UNION Minister for Finance and Corporate Affairs Nirmala Sitharaman chaired a review meeting yesterday on the Budgeted Capital Expenditure (Capex) of the Ministry of Railways (MoR) in New Delhi, yesterday.

This meeting is a part of the series of review meetings that have been scheduled with Ministries/Departments with significant Capex outlays in the Union Budget.

The Railway officials apprised the Union Finance Minister about the capital expenditure plans and progress for the current fiscal year 2024-25.

Underlining the focus of the Government on providing 'ease of living' for citizens, Sitharaman urged the officials of the Ministry of Railways to focus on capacity augmentation, safety and commuter convenience, including doubling and electrification of existing railway tracks and also laying of new railway lines across the country as per the capex outlay provisioned in the Union Budget.

In a big push towards logistics efficiency and reduction of logistics costs related to rail movement, the Interim Budget for 2024-25 provided for three Economic Railway Corridors Programmes identified under the PM Gati Shakti for enabling multi-modal connectivity, including:

The MoR officials informed Sitharaman that 434 railway projects have been identified under three Economic Corridors totalling 40,900 km with a total investment plan of Rs.11.16 lakh crore:

i. Energy, Mineral and Cement Corridor (192 projects),

ii. High Density Network Corridors (200 projects), and

iii. Rail Sagar Projects (42 projects)

The railway officials also apprised that under these Corridors, 55 projects have already been sanctioned till now with total length of 5,723 kms. and investment plan of Rs.1.03 lakh crore. During the current year, 101 projects are to be appraised under the Corridor programme.

The Union Finance Minister further told the officials to expedite the implementation of Kavach system (India's indigenous Automatic Train Protection (ATP) system) in a phased manner and meet the allocated Capex target in the stipulated timeframe. MoR officials informed Sitharaman that Kavach-related works are currently in progress in over 3000RKm (route kms) on the Delhi-Howrah and Delhi-Mumbai sections.

The railway officials apprised the Union Finance Minister of the operationalization of Kavach Version 4.0 on the Kota–Sawai Madhopur Section by the Kota Division of West Central Railway.

The MoR officials mentioned that as on 16th September 2024, the 108 km stretch from Kota to Sawai Madhopur was successfully operationalised with Kavach Version 4.0 at a record pace of 54 km per month, following its finalisation by RDSO on 16 th July 2024, by the operationalisation of Train No. 05913 Kota–Jamuna Bridge Passenger and Train No. 05914 Agra–Kota Passenger.

The Union Finance Minister also stated that the MoR should expedite the conversion of 40,000 normal rail bogies to Vande Bharat standards - as announced in the Interim Budget 2024-25 - in order to enhance the safety, convenience and comfort of passengers.

Sitharaman exhorted the MoR officials to ensure that capex target for FY 2024-25 is achieved in a time-bound manner and take forward the momentum achieved in the first 100 days of this Government.