Piyush Goyal Allays Fears Of Privatisation Of Indian Railways, Says No Such Plans

NEW DELHI || The Narendra Modi government on Friday allayed fears of the opposition parties that it was planning to privatise the Indian Railways. There is no proposal to privatise Indian Railways, union railway minister Piyush Goyal told the Rajya Sabha in a written reply.

Goyal, however said, it is estimated that Indian Railways would need capital investment of Rs 50 lakh crore rupees up to the year 2030 for network expansion, capacity augmentation and modernisation works.

Goyal said that the railways has planned to use the Public-Private Partnership model in a few initiatives including induction of modern rakes to run passenger trains on selected routes to provide improved service delivery and bridge the gap in capital funding as well as bring in modern technology.

The Minister said, the work of train operations and safety certification will continue to be with Indian Railways in all such cases. Goyal also informed that the private investors are required to invest in modern rolling stock and maintenance depots.

He clarified that the operation of the existing services of Indian Railways is not going to be affected. He said, as of now, no regular passenger train service running over India Railways is being operated by Private Operators.