CHINA SHOWS INTEREST IN HIGHSPEED RAIL PROJECTS

China on Wednesday said it was working on railway projects that focused on increasing speed limits of Indian trains, hours ahead of the much-anticipated inauguration of India’s first bullet train project by visiting Japanese PM Shinzo Abe.

Beating China, Japan had bagged the 508-kilometere long Mumbai-Ahmedabad bullet train project, a flagship venture for the Indian Railways that is often criticised for its ageing infrastructure and lack of modernisation.

China has the world’s longest high-speed rail network of 22,000km at the end of last year; that’s about 60% of the world’s total. China has connected most of its cities with high speed trains, drastically reducing the travel time.

“As for railway cooperation, I can tell you it is part of practical cooperation between China and India,” ministry of foreign affairs spokesperson Geng Shuang said on Wednesday.

“We have reached important consensus in this regard. According to my information, the relevant competent authorities between the two countries have maintained communication on promoting and increasing the speed of the railway in the current projects,” Geng added.

“China is pleased to see the infrastructure cooperation amongregionalcountriesincluding on high speed railway, and we stand ready to promote cooperation with India and other regional countries to promote regional development,” Geng said.

In 2016, China’s largest highspeed train maker announced that its first $63.4 million joint venture plant in India to repair and manufacture locomotive engines started operations in Haryana. The state-run China Railway Rolling Stock Corporation is the first foreign company to set up assembly line of rail transportation equipment in India after Prime Minister Narendra Modi unveiled his ambitious ‘Make in India’ campaign in 2014, the company had said in statement last August.