Spl purpose vehicles to fast-track projects

BHUBANESWAR: In a significant departure from earlier system of ending meetings with assurances, railway minister Suresh Prabhu on Monday mooted special purpose vehicles (SPVs) for fast-tracking rail projects in Odisha.
The railway minister made the announcement when chief minister Naveen Patnaik met him in New Delhi to apprise the former of the need for faster growth of rail network in the state and allocation of more funds in the rail budget, a state government release issued here said.
Prabhu said the first meeting between railway board and state commerce and transport department to discuss finer details of the projects would soon be held in New Delhi.
Most on-going and proposed rail projects in Odisha are ‘profitable in nature’ and would be given ‘adequate budget funding’, the railway minister said as Naveen sought Rs 3,200 crore for different projects in the 2015-16 budget. He said SPVs could be formed with equity participation from the railways and the state government, so that revenue earned from each project could be ‘ploughed back in toto into the state for other projects’.
Prabhu said his ministry gave top priority to completion of projects for 2015 July Nabakalebara. The projects, which figured in the meeting, include doubling of Khurda-Delanga-Puri line, third line between Bhubaneswar and Barang, doubling of Cuttack-Barang and Rajaathagarh-Barang lines, improvement of Puri station, construction of a Yatri Complex there and additional platforms at Bhubaneswar station.
The chief minister informed Prabhu that rail network in the state remained ‘grossly inadequate with seven backward tribal-dominated and Maoist-affected districts totally excluded’. Poor rail network had become a major handicap for industrial development, though the state is home to about one-third of country’s mineral resources. Naveen said the railways earns about Rs 14,000 crore annually from Odisha, but allocation for the state in railway budgets had been meagre. Last year, against a requirement of Rs 3160 crore, the state got only Rs 1,400 crore, he said to drive home the point.
Naveen said projects declared earlier like wagon factory at Sitalapalli in Ganjam, wagon maintenance workshop at Kalahandi and skill development centre at Koraput should be implemented at the earliest.