Railways and realism
On the amount needed to complete all the projects announced by the ministry
For the better part of a decade now, the railways have been under a ruinous political spell. This is well known. The effects of that binge are now emerging.
On Sunday, the minister of state for railways, Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury, said as much as ₹ 2.5 trillion will be required to complete all the projects announced by the ministry. The Anil Kakodkar committee on railway safety had estimated the money needed for safety related improvements at ₹ 1 trillion over five years.
These are not piffling sums, and the markets and the government combined can’t supply them. The usual Indian option of cutting corners and making a hash job of project implementation will do no good. A better option is to drastically prune the project list to the bare essentials. The remaining ones must await a substantial hike in passenger tariffs and the return of a sane political climate.
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