Rail freight corridors may go to private builders

Indian Railways is planning to introduce a Build-Operate-Transfer model in the construction of Dedicated Freight Corridors (DFCs). It is for the first time that Railways will be opting for a BOT model by engaging private players.

New Delhi: A railway official informed that the BOT model will be implemented on the stretch of Bihar's Sonnagar to West Bengal's Dankuni in Eastern Dedicated Freight Corridor, which is 538 km in length, under the Public-Private Partnership model. The estimated cost of this stretch would be Rs 15,000 crore.

Alston's, World Bank, Tata Projects, L&T, and many other private players have shown interest in this model. Indian Railways is planning to experiment Design, Build, Finance, Maintenance and Transfer model (DBFMT) in this stretch.

In the construction of DFC, the private players will be in charge of maintenance as well. Railways will float a tender for this after getting a nod from NITI Aayog.

If this model is successful, it may further be implemented in the other three upcoming DFCs, including East-Coast Corridor, East-West Corridor and North-South corridor, which were announced by Finance Minister in her budget speech earlier this month.

The Eastern and Western Dedicated Freight Corridors are expected to be completed by June 2022. Recently, the Ministry of Railways had informed that the Capex utilization in DFC has been increased by 21 percent as compared to last year.

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