Mamata holds pre-budget discussions with trade, industry

Union Minister for Railways, Kumari Mamata Banerjee holding Pre-Budget Interaction with representatives of Trade & Industry and Chambers of Commerce, in New Delhi on February 06, 2010. Chairman, Railway Board, S.S. Khurana and Members Railway Board are also seen.

Railways Minister Mamata Banerjee today urged industry and trade to work in close partnership with the Railways for the development of railway infrastructure to meet the growing aspirations of the people of the country and the increasing needs in the transportation sector.

Speaking at meeting with representatives of trade industry ahead of the Railway Budget for 2010-11 to be presented in Parliament later this month, Ms Banerjee said investments were needed to produce more railway coaches, locomotives, wagons and ancillary components.

She said the industry would have ample opportunities to make profitable investments and at the same time contirbute to the expansion of the railways.

More than 200 people attended today's meeting, including representatives of the Federation of Indian Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FICCI), the Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry (ASSOCHAM), Confederation of Indian Industry (CII), and the PHD Chamber of Commerce and Industry.

Railway Board Chairman S S Khurana and all members of the Board, representatives of Railway Employees' Associations and members of the various expert committees of Railways were also present. Dr Amit Mitra, Secretary-General, FICCI and Chairman of Expert Committee of Railways, and Mr Samar Jha, Additional Member (Budget), Railway Board, also participated in the discussions.

Ms Banerjee said the Vision 2020 Document on the Railways that she had presented to Parliament recently had spelt out the future needs of the Railways and the possible areas where investments could be made.

She said the document had chalked out a very ambitious plan of creating 25,000 km of railway network in a period of ten years

She mentioned port connectivity and industrial hub connectivity projects and projects for transportation of core items like coal, cement and iron ore were some of the areas which offered investment opportunities.

Ms Banerjee said augmentation of wagon manufacturing capacity was the need of the hour to meet the increasing demand for rakes from the industry. She said the Railways would do its best to facilitate availability of sufficient wagons for transportation of bulk commodities.

She also spoke about private sector investor in areas like construction of road overbridges and manning of unmanned level crossings. She also talked of commercial utilisation of surplus land and space availablewith the Railways.

The Minister said the core service sector would remain with the Railways and private participation would be invited in infrastructure, tourism, logistic parks and so on.

Promising to remove red-tapism and simplify procedures, she said representatives of industry and trade owuld be included in the Railways' User Consultative Committees at all levels.

Mr Khurana said the expansion of the network to connect unserved areas at a very ambitious rate of 2500 km per annum, doubling/quadrupling and electrification of key routes, completion of gauge conversion, raising of speed for both passenger and freight traffic, elimination of shortages of any kind in freight and passenger service, prevention and elimination of accidents and equipment failures technological upgradation and modernisation are some of the major goals set in the Vision document.

He said the Railways had assessed that they would require an investment of the order of Rs.14,00,000 crore over the next ten years. He said that there are therefore great challenges for growth and generation of internal resources and execution of identified projects through the public-private partnership (PPP) mode.

NNN