Indian Railways unveils Rs30,000-crore infrastructure upgradation

Indian Railways has drawn up plans for a massive the upgradation of rail infrastructure and procurement of new rolling stock assets during the current financial year with an estimated expenditure of Rs30,000 crore to shore up the infrastructural development and upkeep.

The move would also provide a boost to the flagging Indian economy, caused by the global slowdown.  Some of the projects under execution are as follows:

•  Indian Railways has set a target of rail renewal over 2941km which will require 3,39,288 MT of rail steel. 
• Sleeper renewal over 2382kms which will require approximately 38.59 lakhs pre-stressed concrete sleepers
• A target of renewal of 44.5 lakhs of PSC sleepers has been fixed for open line works, requiring around 88,200 MT of steel.
• In addition, 5000 MT of steel is likely to be used towards the manufacture of steel channel sleepers.
• During 2008-09, 5294 MT of steel bridge girders have already been produced up to the month of October 2008, and the total production in the financial year is likely to exceed that of 2007-08 i.e. 8615 MT of steel bridge girders. 
• The railways have also ecided to manufacture 3,000 coaches this year, which is an increase of 12.5 per cent over the previous year.
• It plans to acquire 2,873 EMUs, 1091 MEMUs, 216 Kolkatta Metro Coaches and a 3-phase propulsion system for 200 motor coaches at an expected investment of about Rs9,200 crore. 
• Production of diesel locomotives and high horse power EMD Design Locomotives would be enhanced at the Diesel Locomotive Works, Varanasi.  DLW has been able to produce 152 locomotives during the first seven months of the current fiscal as against 137 in the corresponding last year marking an increase of 10.9 per cent.
• The production of wheels and axles is being increased by 60 per cent in comparison to the last year.
• Work is in progress for the development of 300 railway stations into model stations. Besides, Indian Railways proposes to develop 23 world class stations of which four are being taken up in the first stage.
• The railways setting up a 1000 MW thermal power plant through a joint venture with NTPC at Nabi Nagar, Bihar with a total cost of Rs. 5352 Crore.
• Indian Railways are also seeking an allocation of a coal block of 300 MT which is proposed to be utilised for setting up a 2000 MW power plant.
• About Rs300 Crore will be spent during the next three months for commissioning modern electronic signalling systems at about 400 stations, intermediate block signalling in about 200 block sections and 400 route kms of automatic block signalling.
•  Rs1,800 Crore will be spent during the next year (2009-10) for the modernisation / upgradation of signalling systems such as Electronic Interlocking, Centralised Panel Operation(500 stations), on board train protection/ train collision avoidance systems (1800 route kms), automatic signalling (500 route kms) and intermediate block signalling system (200 block sections).
• Railway electrification target for the XIth Plan has been enhanced to 3500km.  Similarly, the electrification target  for the current year has been increased  from 700km to 1,000km.
• Next year, electrification is likely to be undertaken over 1200km with Rs1,000 crore, between Ghaziabad-Moradabad, Shoranur-Mangalore and Gondia – Ballarshah, among others.
• The high-traffic density network of Indian Railways, including DC-AC conversion in Mumbai, is being strengthened for carrying heavier trains and the requirement of fund for these works in 2009-10 is Rs500 crore.
• Acquisition of electric locomotives has been enhanced from to 220 in 2008-09 at a cost of about Rs1,740 crore. It has already initiated acquiring 200 electric locomotives from BHEL at an approximate cost of Rs. 5.5 crore each.
• A factory is to be set up at Madhepura for manufacturing 100 electric locomotives per year through JV route.  Bid process is presently underway.
• Indian Railways is seeking an outlay of Rs2,800 crore towards undertaking telecommunication works till 2011-12.
• These telecommunication works include replacement of more than 10,000 route kilometres of overhead alignment in the optical fibre communication and Quad Cable network, provision of a very high capacity DWDM network, modernise the switching and networking structure and mobile train radio communication.