Indian Railways to join hands with Malaysia to modernise and redevelop 20 stations across country

The Dollar Business Bureau

The Indian Railways is making plans to join hands with Malaysia to redevelop about 20 stations in Tier-II cities across the country.

This project could attract nearly Rs 1 lakh crore in private investment the railways said. The redevelopment project entails infrastructure revamp at platforms and in the circulating areas. 

The project also encompasses development of station areas for commercial purposes. The government has plans to construct hotels, eateries, shopping malls, office complexes and multiplexes in the excess land that railways has, for the developers to be used for 45 years. 

For facilitating growth of Tier II cities such as Faridabad, Cuttack, Amritsar, Jamshedpur, Kochi, Jammu, and Bikaner, the Centre, state and local governments provide a lot of support to transform them into business havens and into fast growing cities. 

According to an official spokesman of the Railways, ‘a long term partnership will be forged with Malaysia on a government-to-government basis for offering about 20 stations to the southeast country.’

An ambitious project of redeveloping 400 stations under the PPP model with an investment of about Rs 1 lakh crore is already under progress. 23 railway stations that include the historic Mumbai Central, Howrah station and the Chennai Central have been selected for the first phase of redevelopment, wherein the assets in these historic stations will be put into best use. 

Malaysia is likely to be offered 23 stations, if their bidding is successful, 20 other stations will be taken up separately with Rs 10,000 crore investment on a government-to-government partnership basis, the official added. The redevelopment project will be launched after getting Cabinet approval.

Other stations being modernised in the first phase include Pune, Thane, Visakhapatnam, Kamakhya, Jammu Tawi, Udaipur City, Secunderabad, Vijaywada, Ranchi, Kozhikode, Yesvantpur, Bangalore Cantt, Bhopal, Bandra Terminus, Borivali and Indore.

Bhopal station has already been awarded to a developer for redevelopment.

Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu will inaugurate the start of the work at an estimated cost of Rs 450 crore involving construction of hotels, hospitals, parking lot, offices and restaurants at the station premises.