Indian Railways To Invest Over Rs 13,500 Crore To Upgrade Speed Of Trains On Busy Delhi-Howrah, Delhi-Mumbai Routes

Indian Railways envisions to reduce the travel time on the Delhi-Howrah and Delhi-Mumbai routes by investing more than Rs 13,500 crore, Rail Analysis India reports. It is one of the 11 proposals in the 100-day plan, with implementation to have begun before 31 August.

“In a proposal approved by Railway Minister Piyush Goyal, the Railways plans to increase the train speed to 160 km/hr on the busy routes of Delhi-Mumbai and Delhi-Howrah in the next 4 years,” a senior Railway official said. Currently, the trains travel at a maximum speed of 130 km/hr.

The official added that by increasing speed on the busy railroad, the travel time between Delhi-Howrah, and Delhi-Mumbai, would reduce to 12 hours and 10 hours respectively. Currently, it takes 17 hours for trains to cover 1,525-km long Delhi-Howrah route and 15.5 hours to cover 1,483-km long Delhi-Mumbai route.

The cost to upgrade the speed on the Delhi-Howrah route is Rs 6,684 crore, and the Delhi-Mumbai route is Rs 6,806 crore. Railways have set a deadline of four years from the date of approval to implement the project. Currently, the proposal is being sent to the Cabinet Committee for Economic Affairs (CCEA) for approval.