Indian Railway Allots A Whooping Rs 98,000 Cr. On Mumbai-Ahmedabad Bullet Train
Indian Railways signed a deal with The Japanese International Corporation Agency (JICA) for the ambitious Mumbai-Ahmedabad bullet train today. In this joint venture, the Japanese firm has agreed to provide a soft loan of Rs 79,380 crore, which is 81% of the total project cost of Rs 98,000 crore. According to A.K. Mittal, Chairman of the Railway Board, the loan would have tenure of 15 years, and a moratorium of another 15 years, at an interest rate of 0.1%.
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Rs. 98,000 Cr. + Rs. 10,000 Cr.
Due to an issue with land allotment, there is a proposal that the Mumbai-Ahmedabad bullet train may run on an elevated corridor. This proposal is likely to increase the cost of the project by an estimated Rs 10,000 crore.
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Connecting Ahmedabad And Mumbai
The high speed train corridor is expected to have 11 stations, with seven stations in Maharashtra alone. According to the initial proposal, the high-speed train will have halts at Thane (that will connect both Central and Navi Mumbai), Virar, Palghar, Vapi, Valsad and Ahmedabad.
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How Fair Is It?
If the project begins by the end of this year, then India might have its first bullet train by 2024. But the question is, is spending more than Rs 1,00,000 crore on a bullet train that’ll serve just a handful of the Indian population legitimate? So much can be done with Rs 1,00,00,00,00,00,000 in a developing country. As much as we need some hi funda development, we also need to take care of the mess that already exists. We cannot ignore that. Can we?
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