Land acquisition is a major challenge for us: DFCCIL

NEW DELHI: Dedicated Freight Corridor Corporation of India Limited (DFCCIL) is a special purpose vehicle set up in 2006 to plan, construct and maintain the country’s

NEW DELHI: Dedicated Freight Corridor Corporation of India Limited (DFCCIL) is a special purpose vehicle set up in 2006 to plan, construct and maintain the country’s dedicated freight corridors, which are the backbone of goods transportation by rail in India. DFCCIL managing director Adesh Sharma tells HT how the organisation is changing freight transportation. Excerpts:

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How was DFCCIL’s financial performance in 2015-16? The last fiscal saw a major boost in the activities of DFCCIL on all fronts — be it in the award of contracts, physical and financial progress of the already awarded contracts, funding arrangements with World Bank, land acquisition or environmental clearances. In 2015-16, contracts worth ` 24,102 crore were awarded.

DFCCIL was set up to turn around the declining freight earnings of the Railways. How are you performing on that front? The golden quadrilateral and its diagonals constitute 16% of route length of India’s railway network but carry 58% of the total freight traffic. Also, the eastern and western dedicated freight corridors (EDFC and WDFC) constitute 22% of total traffic and 38% of traffic on the golden quadrilateral. Initially, it is planned to divert 70% of the freight traffic running on the parallel routes of Railways. The average speed is expected to be more than doubled from 25 kmph to 70 kmph.

Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) announced a loan of ` 6,170 crore to the Indian Railways to develop the dedicated freight corridor. What is the progress? JICA has given the loan for the construction of the western dedicated freight corridor. Civil contracts for 92% length have already been awarded and work is in progress on RewariIqbalgarh (639 km), Iqbalgarh-Vadodara (308 km), Vadodara-Vaitarna (322 km) and Vaitarna-Jawaharlal Nehru Port Terminal (110 km) lines.

There has been a rise in interest among private players in Indian freight infrastructure. What are your views? Since DFC will be a game changer in the transport scenario, more investments will be needed for development of infrastructure along all corridors. In line with these requirements, a proactive approach has been adopted to have tie-ups with state governments.

What are some of the challenges that DFCC faces in improving India’s rail freight infrastructure? Land acquisition is a major challenge since the project is spread over a length of 3,350 kms and passes through nine states covering 11,672 hectares of land. This has also led to a lot of litigation, with DFCCIL engaged in 5,355 court and arbitration cases on the eastern, western corridor.