Amritsar-Delhi high speed rail corridor in the offing

Chandigarh, June 2 (UNI) The Punjab Government has agreed in principle to set up a high speed passenger Rail Corridor linking New Delhi with Amritsar via Chanidgarh, in collaboration with the Ministry of Railways.

This was disclosed here today by Chief Secretary R I Singh after meeting a high level delegation of the Railway Board. The delegation was headed by Mr J P Batra, Chairman Railway Board and comprised of Mr R Sivadasan, Financial Commissioner Railways, Mr Satish Kumar, ED Corporate Coordination and Ms Anjali Goyal, ED Finance, Resource Mobilization of the Railway Board.

Giving details of the project, Mr Singh said that the route of the proposed high speed passenger rail corridor would be Delhi-Chandigarh-Amritsar. It would be approximately 500 kms in length and its would cost about Rs 40 to 50 crores per km.

The Punjab Government has suggested setting up an expert committee to interact with experts in order to prepare the feasibility report and to examine in detail the recommendations and alternatives.

The setting up of the high speed rail corridor would certainly give a boost to the state's economy as this project would provide high speed movement to the public in general and the business community in particular. It would also boost trade and commerce and reduce the ever increasing traffic on roads.

While making a brief presentation on high speed trains, Mr Batra said that a new trend in customer expectations and the rapid urbanization in the country had triggered a growing demand for inter city traffic between metropolitan cities and two and three tier cities. He said that safer travel, better ambience and world class comfort, stress free journey and sharp punctuality were the purposes behind setting up of high speed train corridors.

He said that the central government was already holding consultations with the governments of Maharashtra, Gujrat and Haryana on similar proposals.

UNI