Six corridors identified across India

India is set to conduct feasibility studies on high speed rail connectivity in six corridors, according to a Press Information Bureau on 27 Mar 2018.

As High Speed Projects are highly capital and technology intensive sanction of High Speed Projects is subject to its technical feasibility, financial viability and availability of resources, said the press note.

The corridors on Diamond Quadrilateral connecting metropolitan cities and growth centres of the country — Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai & Kolkata – have been identified for feasibility study for high speed rail connectivity viz: (i) Delhi-Mumbai, (ii) Mumbai-Chennai, (iii) Chennai-Kolkata, (iv) Kolkata-Delhi and both diagonals i.e. (v) Delhi-Chennai and (vi) Mumbai-Kolkata routes.

At present, Mumbai-Ahmedabad Rail corridor is the only sanctioned High Speed Rail Project in the country and implemented with technical and financial assistance of Japanese Government.

The estimated cost of the Project is Rs.1,08,000 crore.

Japan has agreed to provide a soft loan of 81% of total project cost with 0.1% rate of interest per annum.

The time period for repayment of loan is 50 years with 15 years grace period. fii-news.com