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With its finances looking up, Konkan Railway Corporation (KRCL) is working on doubling the entire Konkan railway route of 739 km at an initial project cost of ₹11,000 crore and a deadline of five to seven years.
The KRCL has taken up a pilot project of doubling of the section between Roha and Veer in Maharashtra, a distance of 49 km., at an estimated cost of ₹295 crore.
Traffic studies As for the entire project, traffic studies are going on and KRCL is working on the model to fund the project, which may eventually go up to ₹14,000-15,000 crore, said Chairman and Managing Director of KRCL Sanjay Gupta here on Wednesday.
Track doubling will enhance capacity by 2.5 times and improve speed, besides enabling KRCL to handle freight traffic from port connectivity, said Gupta, addressing a press conference in the city.
In reply to a question on the ambitious electrification programme of the KRCL, he said the target time for electrification had been set at 36 months for the whole of Konkan Railway’s route length of 739 km and would cost ₹709 crore.
Freight revenue Once the four new minor ports coming up in Karnataka became functional and economic activity step up in the next few years in view of growing infrastructure connectivity and industrialisation along its route, the Konkan Railway is looking to have a quantum jump in its cargo revenue in the next few years, Gupta said.
He said the annual revenues of the KRCL at present were approximately ₹2,500 crore with 55-45 per cent in favour of passenger and freight. With the resumption of mining activity in Karnataka and Goa, freight earnings will go up in the near future, he said.
Fiscal position Speaking on the financial position of the KRCL, which had been debt-ridden, Gupta explained said the initial debts of ₹1,900 crore had shot up to ₹5,500 crore over the years. Out of this, ₹4000 crore had been taken over by the Indian Railways through debt restructuring, turning it into preferential equity with a moratorium of 20 years.
With this, the debt burden has reduced considerably and it has come down to ₹1,500 crore.
Gupta said that with the KRCL making an operational surplus of ₹300 crore in 2015-16, it was able to service the debt with annual liability towards it coming to around ₹150-140 crore.
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