Rlys on the beaten track
The national transport utility’s long-awaited draft national plan merely reiterates a direction that has already been set
Four years after a National Rail Plan (NRP), a vision document setting out the long-term investment for the Indian Railways, was first proposed, a draft was floated for public comment in December last year. But its content is unlikely to surprise those who track this sector. If anything, it continues along the tracks already set. Increasing the speed of trains and more private participation is definitely on the agenda, as is the proposal for weaning the Indian Railways from diesel to environmentally friendly electric locomotives.
“A central feature of the draft National Rail Plan is the emphasis on electrification of railway network and the dedicated freight corridors (DFCS). These corridors will allow faster speeds for goods trains that were otherwise not given preference over passenger trains such as the Shatabdi and Rajdhani on popular routes. The DFCS will also free up the train networks for more efficient plying of passenger trains,” said Satish Mohan Singla, former member, Railway Board, adding, “These concepts are not new and they have been in the works for a long time now.”
This much awaited National Rail Plan was initially spelled out by then Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu in the February 2016 Railway Budget speech. That also happened to be the last Railway Budget speech to be separately delivered and it was said that the National Rail Plan-2030 would be revealed a year from then.
Later in December 2016, Prabhu launched a dedicated website to collect stakeholders’ inputs on this plan. The vision then was for integrated planning and cost optimisation by laying the new railway lines and new highways together in tunnels and over mega-bridges.
That grand plan appears to have been repurposed in the proposed draft National Rail Plan for India which now takes the year 2050 as the horizon. But the document falls back to 2030 for developing capacity that will cater to growing demand up to 2050.
The problem, however, could lie in execution. For instance, while announcing the National Rail Plan-2030, Prabhu also presented a White Paper on the Indian Railways in 2015. Among other things, the goal by 2020 was for the Indian Railways to increase average train speed by 50 per cent. This has been one of the biggest challenges for the Railways with average speed of freight trains plateauing at 24 kilometres per hour (kmph), which is nil improvement from 2015.
The Covid-19 months did see average freight train speeds doubling to 45 kmph in December 2020. But this could be attributed to the fact that fewer passenger trains were operating, and that the speed would revert to the lower average once normalcy returns.
Earlier this month, the Railways said freight trains have clocked a top speed of 90 kmph on the newly inaugurated Khurja-new Bhaupur section of Eastern Dedicated Freight Corridor. This was a first and gives a glimpse of the potential that can be tapped.
According to the latest estimates, a freight speed of 50 kmph could be coupled with 30 per cent reduction in transport costs from a business-as-usual scenario on the railway network. These faster trains will help the Railways get more share of the total freight ecosystem, with estimates pitching the modal share to 44 per cent (see table). If the speed is not upped, faster trucks on the road would lead to Railways losing out share, dropping further from the 27 per cent it currently ferries.
The expansion of freight corridors would lower the pressure on the railway tracks by allowing speeding freight and passenger trains. The eastern freight corridor (1,875 route km) is to connect Ludhiana to Dankuni (near Kolkata) via Dadri and the western corridor (1,506 route km) will connect Navi Mumbai to Dadri near Delhi. These corridors are also planned from North to South and to Mumbai. About 350 km each have been inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi recently on the western and eastern corridors.
But neither the freight corridors nor speedier trains are new concepts. Back in 2009, the Indian Railways’ Vision 2020 document presented in Parliament by then railway minister (now West Bengal chief minister) Mamata Banerjee aimed at massive addition to its route network, segregation of passenger and freight services into separate double-line corridors, and raising the speeds of passenger trains. Vision 2020 had also envisaged the implementation of at least four high-speed rail projects to provide bullet train services at 250-350 kmph.
This continuation of central themes and projects across railway visions had been recognised by Modi, too. But his stand has been that the National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government has more efficiently executed these longawaited projects.
Inaugurating the eastern corridor, Modi said, “The [freight corridor] project was approved in 2006. Such was the situation that not even one kilometre track could be laid till 2014. After the formation of the government in 2014, officials were asked to start fresh and the budget increased by about 11 times, ~45,000 crore. About 1,100 km of work will be completed in the next few months. Imagine, not a single kilometre in eight years, and 1100 kilometres in 6-7 years.”
Modi has also been hard-selling the bullet train project, something that can be said to be already delayed going by Banerjee’s Vision 2020.
Simply put, these vision documents do not offer much help with the actual execution of these long-term projects. At best, they offer some perspective of successive governments’ ambitions.
The vision documents do not offer much help with the actual execution of long-term projects. At best, they offer some perspective of successive governments’ ambitions