No proposal for Visakhapatnam Metro Rail Project: Union minister Hardeep Puri

VISAKHAPATNAM: Union Minister of Housing and Urban Affairs Hardeep Puri stated that there is no pending proposal from the Government of Andhra Pradesh for sanction of the Visakhapatnam Metro Rail Project.


Replying to a starred question by Rajya Sabha member GVL Narasimha Rao of BJP, the Union Minister stated in a written reply that the Government of India had requested the AP Government to resubmit a proposal as per the revised Metro Rail Policy, 2017 and informed that the state government has not submitted any proposal in this regard.

The minister informed that the AP government in the year 2018 informed that they intend to build a light rail project under Public Private Partnership (PPP) and requested central government support for external financial assistance from Korea (Korean EXIM Bank). However, the Korean EXIM Bank had shown its inability to fund this project.

The AP government was advised about the refusal of the Korean EXIM bank in April 2019. The state government was asked that the Visakhapatnam Metro project proposal might be posed to other bilateral or multilateral agencies for loan assistance. However, the AP government had not submitted any proposal for financial assistance from other bilateral or multilateral agencies for the Visakhapatnam Light Metro Rail project to date.

Commenting on the Union Minister's reply in Parliament, MP GVL Narasimha Rao observed that lack of interest on the part of the AP state government alone was responsible for Visakhapatnam not getting the much-needed Metro Rail Project.

Instead of falsely blaming the Central government for its inaction, the YSRCP government should formulate new proposals for the construction of the Visakhapatnam Metro Rail Project and seek support from the Central Government towards Viability Gap Funding (VGF), he advised.