Rail Tariff Authority likely by FY19

The Railway Ministry has announced that its tariff regulator, the Rail Tariff Authority, will be in place by FY19.

Announcing a slew of measures in a medium-term plan of action, Indian Railways said it had also shortlisted five international bidders for 15 train sets (315 railcars) for participating in its request for proposal (RFP).

Financial bids for the project worth ₹2,500 crore are likely by the month-end, a statement from Indian Railways said.

Train sets (electrical multiple units or local trains) are being procured to speed –up train travel on its existing infrastructure and would be used on high density routes such as Delhi- Kanpur.

Two locomotive factories at Madhepura (for electric engines) and at Marhowra (for diesel engines) in Bihar with an investment of ₹3,500 crore is likely to be done by FY19. An order book of about ₹40,000 crore is envisaged for both the plants over the next 11 years.

Of this, a major portion of equity would be funded through FDI with bids for both the factories being done successfully.

To enhance the average speed of goods trains, the Railways has targeted award of contracts worth ₹17,000 crore by March 2016 and said that implementation of the 3,300-km-long Dedicated Freight Corridor (DFC) was on track for commissioning by 2018.

Meanwhile, two loan agreements worth ₹11,375 crore has been negotiated with the World Bank for the Eastern DFC besides finalising contracts worth ₹17,500 crore in the last one year.

Indian Railways is also evaluating a bid to procure 200 locomotives (of 9,000 hp each) for ₹5,000 crore for the Western DFC besides setting up a maintenance facility at Rewari in Haryana.

Also on the anvil is design and development of 25-tonne axle load wagons which can carry a payload of 80 tonnes, enhancing freight carrying capacity by 15 per cent.

The Railways has also enhanced the carrying capacity of steel coil wagon by 68 per cent and also pressed into service six rakes to carry automobiles – each rake having a capacity to carry 318 cars.

The Railways plan to completely switch over to LHB coaches (Linke Hofman and Busch, an Alstom Company) by FY19. For this, IR has commissioned a second unit for manufacturing these coaches at ICF Chennai besides putting up a unit for producing LHB bogie frames at Budge Budge near Kolkata.

Gauge conversion of 3,200 km, new lines of 1,700 km and doubling of 8,100 km is also likely by FY19.

Connectivity to the North Eastern states has also been envisaged with Agartala, Aizawl and Imphal expected to be connected via broad gauge trains by FY19 besides the completion of Bogibeel bridge over Brahmaputra at Dibrugarh and construction of a third alternative route via New Maynaguri- Jogighopa.