Indian Railways to electrify all broad gauge lines by 2023-24

The Indian Railways has been progressing in mission mode towards its electrification targets and plans to electrify all broad gauge lines by 2023-24. There has been notable progress in this regard, and IR is likely to electrify all BG rail lines by 2023-24. The total range of the complete Indian railway's network (all Gauges) is 67,956 route km, as of 1 April 2020. 484 Railway projects of 51,165 km length, costing about Rs 7.54 lakh crore, are in different stages of planning, approval, and execution, as of 1 April 2021, out of which 10,638 km length has been commissioned, and expense of Rs 2,13,815 crore has been spent up to March 2021. These comprise 187 new line projects of 21,037 km length, costing Rs 4,04,986 crore, out of which commissioning of 2,621 km length has been obtained, and payment of Rs 1,05,591 crore has been spent up to March 2021. As many as 46 gauge conversion projects having a length of 6,213 km, requiring Rs 53,171 crore, out of which commissioning of 3,587 km length has been obtained and amount of Rs. 22,184 crore has been spent, up to March 2021. 251 doubling projects of 23,915 km length, valuing Rs 2,96,186 crore, out of which commissioning of 4,430 km length has been obtained, and payment of Rs 86,041 crore has been spent, up to March 2021. Fulfilment of railway projects depends on several factors like an expeditious land procurement by the state government, shifting of infringing utilities, forest clearance by officials of the forest department, geological and topographical conditions of the area, law and order situation in the project site, statutory clearances from numerous authorities, the number of working months in a year for specific project site because of climatic situations etc, and all these factors impact the fulfilment time. The estimated amount to be spent on electrification of balanced broad gauge routes of Indian Railways is approximately Rs 21,000 crore. Indian Railways yearly usage of electricity for traction purposes was approximately 18.41 billion units during 2019-20 and 14.1 billion units during 2020-21. The computed electricity usage after complete electrification of Railway tracks will be 30.13 billion units. Ashwini Vaishnaw, Minister of Railways, Communications and Electronics & Information Technology, in a written answer to a question in Rajya Sabha, gave this information. Image Source Also read: India Railways records highest electrification of sections in 2020-21