New Delhi: The country’s first bullet train project to be started between Ahmedabad-Mumbai could be delayed by 5 years. It is being said that the project is being delayed due to rising costs and cancellation of the tender. Apart from this, many companies of Japan are also not showing interest in the project. It is estimated that the Railways will now be able to complete this project by October 2028. The work of this dream project of the first bullet train was to be completed in December 2023. The National High-Speed Rail Corporation (NHSRCL) is working on this bullet train project.
Many bottlenecks in the project
The English newspaper Indian Express has quoted sources claiming that there are many problems in this project. In this project, a 21-km line is to be laid underground, including a 7-kilometer long tunnel under the sea near Mumbai. Tender was withdrawn at the beginning of this year, but no Japanese company was involved in the tender process. Apart from this, in 11 tenders, companies bid for 90 percent more cost than anticipated. In such a situation, it had to be canceled at the moment. Not only this, it is also being said that many advanced boring machines are needed for laying 21 km underground line. In such a situation, it will take at least 60 months to complete this work.
Land acquisition work stuck!
Apart from this, the newspaper has also claimed that the land acquisition for this project has not been completed. For this, 430 hectares of land is needed for this, but so far only 100 hectares of land has been available to the government. On the other hand, due to the cooperation of the state government in Gujarat, the land acquisition work is going on fast and it is expected that by the end of the year it will get 1000 hectares of land to the government. A spokesperson of NHSRCL says that till now they have got land for 345 km. Please tell that this entire line is 508 km long.
Plans to start from August 2022
Please tell that earlier there was a plan to start bullet train in August 2022 on some part of this project. Actually this year will be the 75th Independence Day of the country. However, Railways officially say that the work will be completed according to the old timeline. To complete this project, the Japan International Co-operation Agency (JICA) is giving 80 per cent loan of Rs 1 lakh crore for 20 years. This loan is given at an interest of 0.1%.
