No privatisation: Railway Minister
In the wake of persistent criticism by opposition parties and trade unions, Railway Minister Piyush refuted any move to privatise the Indian Railways through a tweet.
He clarified that all the current services of the Indian Railways will continue to remain operational and the Railways is not being privatised in any way. As regards 151 additional modern trains planned to be operational on 109 routes with private participation, he said the additional services will not affect the functioning of other trains but will only create more avenues of employment.
Goyal also clarified that the 151 trains would be in addition to the existing trains and so no question of depriving the poor of the cheaper mode of transport. The Ministry in a statement said these proposed trains will run on the routes where the demand for trains is already higher than the existing capacity. The Ministry has invited Request for Qualifications (RFQ) for private participation for operation of passenger train services over 109 Origin Destination (OD) pairs of routes.
The project would entail private sector investment of about Rs30,000 crore. This is the first initiative of private investment for running Passenger Trains over the Indian Railways network.
The objective of this initiative is to introduce modern technology rolling stock with reduced maintenance and transit time as well as to boost job creation, provide enhanced safety and world-class travel experience to passengers. The Ministry said the driver and guard of the trains will be Railway officials and the safety clearance of trains will be done by Railways only. The 109 Origin Destination (OD) Pairs have been formed into 12 Clusters across the Indian Railway network and each train will have a minimum of 16 coaches. It said majority of trains will be manufactured in the country under Make in India and the private entity will be responsible for financing, procuring, operation and maintenance of the trains. It said these trains will be designed for a maximum speed of 160 kilometres per hour. The Private Entity will pay to the Railways fixed haulage charges, energy charges as per actual consumption and a share in Gross Revenue determined through a transparent bidding process since it would be using the railway tracks and other infrastructure of the Railways, the ministry added.