Revised policy to allow developments of a wide range of projects
The Cabinet has approved Ministry of Railway’s proposal to revise its land policy that would lead to development of 300 cargo terminals over the next five years and related projects.
The approval on 7 Sept 2022 will help attract more cargo to railways, increase railways’ modal share in freight transportation thereby reducing logistics cost of the industry.
The Ministry of Railways said, “300 PM Gati Shakti Cargo Terminals would be developed over next five years and about 1.2 lakh employment would be generated.”
Further, the simplify approvals for utilities as envisaged in PM Gati Shakti Programme, will help in development of public utilities like electricity, gas, water supply, telecom cable, sewage disposal, drains, optical fibre cables (OFC), pipelines, roads, flyovers.
The developments will also cover terminals, regional rail transport, urban transport in an integrated manner.
Liberalizing the land leasing policy would open avenues for all stakeholders, service providers, operators to establish more cargo related facilities and render their participation assisting in generation of additional cargo traffic and freight revenues to Railways.
The policy also encourages development of social infrastructure, such as hospitals through PPP and schools through Kendriya Vidyalaya Sangthan, on railway land at a nominal annual fee of Rs.1 per sqm per annum.
The revised railways’ land policy will enable integrated development of infrastructure and more cargo terminals.
It provides for long term leasing of railway land for cargo related activities for a period up-to 35 years @1.5% of market value of land per annum.
The existing entities using railway land for cargo terminals will have the option to switch to the new policy regime after transparent and competitive bidding process.
Comprehensive Policy document will be framed and implemented within 90 days of cabinet approval.
The approvals for setting up utilities envisaged under PM Gati Shakti Programme will be simplified.
Railways’ organization and network spans the entire country.
However, railways with its existing land policies could not integrate well with other modes of infrastructure.
Thus, a need was felt to streamline and simplify Railway’s land lease policy to enable faster integrated planning and development of infrastructure across the country under PM Gati Shakti framework, said the Ministry.
Extant policy permits licensing of railway land for a short period up to five years for any railway related activity. Such short-term license period does not attract any serious investors for creating multi-modal cargo hubs.
Long-term leasing of railway land up to 35 years is allowed for leasing government land mainly to Public Sector Undertakings (PSUs), thereby limiting the scope of investments in cargo terminals.
Since rail is an efficient mode of transport it is essential to more freight by rail so as to reduce the logistics cost of the industry.
To enhance the modal share of rail in freight transportation need has been felt to modify the land leasing policy to encourage development of more cargo terminals, it said. fiinews.com
