| Work Detail |
The Indian Railways is planning to operationalise over 1,300 route km of the Eastern Dedicated Freight Corridor (EDFC) by the end of this year. In terms of project milestones, track linking work on the Sonnagar-Ludhiana stretch was completed on 2 August, 2023. Over 77 percent of the project has been commissioned by June-end.
The current 1,337 route km, passes by Sahnewal in Punjab, crosses through Uttar Pradesh and Haryana and terminates at Sonnagar in Bihar. Another part of 538 route km, also a part of the EDFC, between Sonnagar and Dankuni in West Bengal was proposed to be developed under a PPP model.
The eastern corridor will expedite the movement of finished steel, food grains, cement, fertilisers, limestone from Rajasthan to steel plants in the east, and general goods. The Dedicated freight corridor alignment, except a stretch between Jawahar Nehru Port Trust (JNPT) and Vaitarna, is expected to be operational by the end of 2023. This segment will be operational in a years time.
As per earlier plan, the EDFC had a route length of over 1,850 km, covering Punjab (89 km), Haryana (72 km), UP (1078 km), Bihar (239 km), Jharkhand (195 km) and West Bengal (203 km). However, due to non-availability of space near important city centres, the alignment of the corridor will take a detour to bypass densely populated towns such as Allahabad, Kanpur, and others.
A total of 2,196 km comprising 1,046 km of Western Dedicated Freight Corridor and 1,150 km of Eastern Dedicated Freight Corridor have already been commissioned. |
