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Railways Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw announced has an ambitious expansion plan for India’s rail network, aiming to add 3,000 new regular train services over the next five years.
This initiative is part of a broader strategy to enhance capacity for middle and lower-middle-class passengers, following the successful addition of 2,000 train services in the post-COVID period.
Highlighting the sector’s transformation since 2014, Vaishnaw contrasted the current scale of investment with the “peanuts” allocated in the 60 to 70 years prior.
He credited the current government under Prime Minister Naredra Modi for prioritising the sector since 2014, noting that the merger of the railway and general budgets in 2016 was a pivotal step that allowed for much larger funding.
“In the last 60-70 years, the investment in railways was peanuts. It was like 20,000 crore or something. Prime Minister Modi started increasing it in 2014. He merged the budgets,” he said.
