Indian Railways headed by Piyush Goyal is moving towards the goal of complete electrification by December 2023. In this sequence, Western Railway has recently done 100 percent electrification. According to the Ministry of Railways, this will increase the speed of the rail after electrification of all trains and also reduce the carbon footprint in the environment. General Manager of Eastern Railway Manoj Joshi said that Rs 19811.7 crore has been invested by Indian Railways on infrastructural works.
The government last week denied any proposal to privatize Indian Railways, but said that an estimate would require Indian Railways to invest Rs 50 lakh crore in capital for various modernization works, including network expansion to 2,030. Railway Minister Piyush Goyal gave this information to the Rajya Sabha in a written reply to a question by Trinamool Congress (TMC) member Derek O’Brien.
Brian had questioned which of the operational areas of the railway had been privatized? On this, Railway Minister Goyal said that there is no proposal to privatize Indian Railways. However, it is estimated that Indian Railways will need a capital investment of Rs 50 lakh crore for network expansion and other modernization works by 2,030 to provide better passenger and freight services.
He said that there are plans to use the Public-Private Partnership (PPP) model in some initiatives to bridge the gap in capital financing and bring in modern technology. These include running 150 modern rakes to operate passenger trains on select routes. Goyal, however, said that the operation of the train will remain with the Indian Railways.
