Lok Sabha Question No. 308 (STARRED), answered on 2016-12-07
Subject: New Rail Projects
Ministry: RAILWAYS
Asked by: RITA TARAI, BALABHADRA MAJHI

## GOVERNMENT OF INDIA MINISTRY OF RAILWAYS

## LOK SABHA STARRED QUESTION NO. 308 TO BE ANSWERED ON 07.12.2016

## NEW RAIL PROJECTS

* 308.   SHRIMATI RITA TARAI: SHRI BALABHADRA MAJHI:

Will the Minister of RAILWAYS be pleased to state:

- (a) whether the Railways have received proposals from various States including Odisha for sanction/approval of new lines to be connected to major cities and towns and if so, the details thereof;
- (b) the details of proposals approved so far; and
- (c) the details of proposals pending for approval along with the reasons for not approving the said proposals?

## ANSWER

## MINISTER OF RAILWAYS

(SHRI SURESH PRABHAKAR PRABHU)

- (a) to (c):   A Statement is laid on the Table of the House.

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STATEMENT  REFERRED  TO  IN  REPLY  TO  PARTS  (a)  TO  (c)  OF  STARRED QUESTION NO. 308 BY SHRIMATI RITA TARAI AND SHRI BALABHADRA MAJHI TO  BE  ANSWERED  IN  LOK  SABHA  ON  07.12.2016  REGARDING  NEW  RAIL PROJECTS

(a)  to  (c):    Proposals/representations  from  State  Governments,  Ministries  of Central  Government,  Elected  representatives,  organizations/road  users  etc. both formal and informal are received by Railways at various levels including Railway Board, Zonal Railways, Divisional Headquarters etc. As receipt of such complaints/suggestions  is  a  continuous  and  dynamic  process,  centralized compendium of such requests is not maintained.

The  proposals  received  from  various  organizations,  State  Governments, elected  representatives  form  an  important  basis  to  ascertain  requirement  of projects.  After  scrutiny  of  demands,  wherever  feasible,  surveys  for  such demands  of  New  Lines  are  taken  up.  Based  on  the  outcome  of  the  survey, projects are taken up on the basis of remunerativeness, last mile connectivity, missing links and alternate routes, augmentation of congested/saturated lines, socio-economic  considerations  etc.  depending  upon  throwforward  of  ongoing projects, overall availability of funds and competing demands.  However, it is not feasible to maintain data for fulfillment and pendency of such demands and no  time  frame  or  commitment  can  be  given  for  approval  of  all  pending proposals.  Since railway projects generally straddle over more than one State, these are not sanctioned State-wise.

As on 01.04.2016, a total of 166 ongoing New Lines projects spread across the country including the State of Odisha have been taken up for construction of 18,592 Km of New Line at a cost of ` 2,47,840 Crore.  For 2016-17, budgetary allocation of ` 14,166 Crore has been made for these New Line projects.   Out of these, eight new line projects costing ` 11,676 Crore for construction of 1174 Km  of  New  Line  are  falling  fully/partly  in  the  State  of  Odisha  for  which  a budgetary  allocation  of ` 755  Crore  has  been  made  for  the  current  financial year.  This includes two New Line projects included In Budget 2016-17 subject to requisite approval for which Ministry of Railways has entered into an MoU

with Government of Odisha for Cost Sharing.  The details of these two projects are as under:-

- (i) Jeypore-Malkangiri  (130  Km)  -  State  Govt.  sharing  25%  cost  of  the project.
- (ii) Jeypore-Navrangpur  (38  Km)  -  State  Govt.  sharing  50%  cost  of  the project & giving land free.

The total outlay for 2016-17 for the State of Odisha for New Line, Gauge Conversion  &  Doubling  is ` 4,464  Crore  which  is  228%  more  than  the  outlay provided for the year 2014-15.

Further, in anticipation of Government of Odisha coming forward to take up projects  through  Joint  Venture,  4  New  Line  projects  have  been  included  in Capital  Investment  Programme  of  2016-17  (incorporated  as  annexure  to  the 'Pink Book' of sanctioned works) at an anticipated cost of ` 7607 Crore.  Details of these four New Line projects are as under:-

|   S.No. | Name of project                  | Railway   |   Length (in Km) |   Cost ( ` in cr) |
|---------|----------------------------------|-----------|------------------|-------------------|
|       1 | Behrampur-Sambalpur              | ECoR      |            270   |              2957 |
|       2 | Junagarh-Ambaguda via Navrangpur | ECoR      |            145   |              2900 |
|       3 | Banspani-Barbil                  | ECoR      |             17.5 |               350 |
|       4 | Barson-Banspani/ Narayangarh     | ECoR      |             52   |              1400 |

In  this  regard,  MoU  and  Joint  Venture  Agreement  have  been  signed between Government of Odisha and Ministry of Railways to undertake mutually identified rail infrastructure projects for project  development,  resources mobilization and monitoring.

The capital expenditure for railways has been increased from ` 54,000 Cr in 2013-14 to around ` 94,000 Cr in 2015-16. For 2016-17, a plan size of ` 1,21,000 crore has been kept.

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