Government of India and World Bank Sign $1.1 Billion Agreement for the Eastern Dedicated Freight Corridor Project

India's Dedicated Freight Corridor (DFC) program is building dedicated freight-only railway lines along highly congested transport corridors; the World Bank is supporting India’s Eastern DFC from Ludhiana to Kolkata in three phases; by shifting freight from road to rail, the DFC will reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 2.25 times over a 30 year period

The Government of India and the World Bank today signed a $1.1 billion agreement towards the second loan for the Eastern Dedicated Freight Corridor (a freight-only rail line) that will help faster and more efficient movement of raw materials and finished goods between the north and eastern parts of India . The project was approved by the World Bank Board on April 22, 2014.

The World Bank is financing 1,133 km of India ’s 1,839 km Eastern Dedicated Freight Corridor ( Ludhiana - Kolkata) through a series of three projects: Khurja – Kanpur ; Kanpur – Mughal Sarai; and Ludhiana – Khurja. At completion, the program is expected to double the Indian Railways’ carrying capacity along the corridor.

• The DFC will adopt proven international technologies and approaches and introduce a number of transformational advances in the way the Indian Railways organizes itself, constructs infrastructure, and operates its services.
• It will also help develop the institutional capacity of the Dedicated Freight Corridor Corporation of India Ltd (DFCCIL) to build and maintain the infrastructure network.
• By progressively extending the new technology and approaches to other important freight routes, the program will allow India to create one of the largest freight operations in the world.
• It will also enable the Indian Railways to recapture the market share lost to the very competitive trucking sector, which has among the world’s lowest tariffs for road freight.
• The project will benefit the critical power and heavy manufacturing industries in the northern and eastern states through which the corridor passes. These industries rely heavily on the railways to carry their raw materials and take part of their finished and semi-finished goods to both domestic markets as well as to maritime ports on the eastern seaboard.
• By transferring freight to dedicated freight-only lines, congestion on railway tracks in the lower Ganges basin will ease, improving passenger rail services. The region is one of India 's poorest and most densely populated and its citizens rely heavily on rail transport for affordable travel.
• The project will also catalyze economic development in Uttar Pradesh by driving the establishment of industrial corridors and logistics parks along the route.
• In the longer term, an improved eastern corridor will contribute to the development of the proposed Trans-Asian Railway involving infrastructure investments in India , Bangladesh , and countries further east.

Notably, the DFC is a green project as by shifting freight transportation from road to rail it will reduce energy consumption in India 's transport sector. Moreover, unlike the existing rail network, which runs on a combination of diesel and electrical locomotives, the corridor will operate entirely through electric locomotives, reducing carbon emissions significantly. In fact, a carbon footprint analysis conducted by the Indian Railways finds that the DFC will generate 2.25 times less greenhouse gas emissions over a 30 year period compared to business as usual.

Warm regards,

Dr. S P Sharma