logistics
Dedicated freight corridor project to be ready by 2017 Sanjukta Ganguly
R
iding on the waves of India’s economic growth, Indian Railways has witnessed higher freight volumes in recent years. For the Railways, the growth in freight came even without substantial investment in infrastructure, increased axle load, reduction of turn-round time of rolling stock, reduced unit cost of transportation, rationalisation of tariffs (resulting in improvement in market share) and improved operational margins. Over the last two to three years, the rail freight traffic has grown by 8 to 11 percent and was projected to cross 1,100 million tons (mt) by the end of Eleventh Five Year Plan (March 2012). To manage this huge freight traffic growth, there was a necessity for the Railways to link the four metropolitan cities of Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai and Howrah, commonly known as the Golden Quadrilateral; and its two diagonals (Delhi-Chennai and MumbaiHowrah), adding up to a total route length of 10,122 km. This route is estimated to carry more than 55 percent of revenue earning freight traffic of the Indian Railways. However, the existing trunk routes of Howrah-Delhi on the Eastern Corridor and Mumbai-Delhi on the Western Corridor are already highly saturated, with the line capacity utilisation varying between 115 and 150. The surging power sector growth which need heavy coal movement, booming infrastructure construction and growing international trade have thus led to the conception of the Dedicated Freight Corridors (DFC) along the Eastern and Western Routes. According to government sources, this entire dream project of constructing the dedicated freight corridor is envisioned to be ready and operational by 2017.
Tata, Essar in race with Chinese for Eastern DFC
After years of planning, the 3,300-km
Dedicated freight corridor
DFC is finally on the horizon and global construction majors are vying for around `12,000-crore civil works for two packages on the Eastern Corridor. Among those who are in fray are Indian groups like Tatas, Essar and IVCRL, and also the Chinese, Russian and Spanish companies. China Railway First Group, part of the state-owned China Railway Engineering Corporation, in consortium with Soma, Tata-Aldesa, IVRCL-KMB, Essar-PatelBSCPL are among the 10 players who have put in bids for building the Khurja-Bhaupur (343 km) and Rewari-Palanpur (640 km) stretch. Earlier, 13 companies were declared technically-qualified for the Khurja-Kanpur section, but only 10 companies finally submitted their financial bids for this project. Lanco Infratech and Hindustan Construction decided to skip the race. Meanwhile, two Japanese consortiums, Sojitz Corporation-L&T and MitsuiIRCON Leighton are expected to submit financial bids for the Rewari-Palanpur section, a source said. According to reports, land acquisition for the two stretches on the Eastern Corridor is almost complete. The 343-km Khurja-
Bhaupur project was sliced into three subsets, and the bidders had been qualified to bid for one, two or all three. In the bids, the consortia have offered various levels of discounts depending on the size of projects they get. The contractor for the World Bankfunded Eastern Corridor is likely to be announced by the month-end, the source added. The bids are being evaluated by the company and the World Bank. According to Dedicated Freight Corridor Corporation of India Limited (DFCCIL) sources, the Eastern Corridor will traverse six states and is projected to cater to a number of traffic streams – coal for the power plants in the northern region of Uttar Pradesh (UP), Delhi, Harayana, Punjab and parts of Rajasthan from Eastern Coalfields; finished steel, food grains, cement, fertilizers, lime stone from Rajasthan to steel plants in the east and general goods. The total traffic in UP direction is projected to go up to 116 mt by 2021-22. Similarly, in the down direction, the traffic level has been projected to increase to 28 mt by 2021-22. As a result, the incremental traffic since 2005-06 works out to be a whopping 92 mt. A significant part of this increase would get diverted to the DFC. Traffic projections on Eastern DFC
(in million tons/year)
Direction/Commodity
2016-17
2021-22
54.46
61.96
Public Coal
0.61
0.95
Steel
8.24
9.74
Others
1.61
2.96
UP Direction Power House coal
Logistic Park
1.20
2.40
66.12
78.01
Fertilizer
0.23
0.42
Cement
0.78
1.52
Limestone for the Steel Plants
4.99
5.00
Salt
0..68
1.03
Others
1.61
2.96
Logistic Park
1.20
2.40
Sub-Total
9.48
13.32
75.60
91.33
Sub-Total Down Direction
Grand Total
Source: Rites Report (Eastern Corridor PETS Report)
Coal Insights, January 2013
61