BITING THE BULLET

The Bullet Train has been a 'dream project'. Can it become a reality anytime soon?

- DHRUVAKSH SAHA & SHINE JACOB

In February of 2007, J.P. Batra, Railway Board chairman at the time, presented the idea of a high-speed rail to then Railway Minister Lalu Prasad Yadav. A socialist inspired by Jayaprakash Narayan, Yadav said his principles would never allow a premium train only the bourgeoisie could afford.

Batra, already credited with the Deccan Odyssey, a luxury tourism train, was so keen on the project that he defied the minister and convinced Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to give the green signal. Batra and Finance Commissioner R. Sivadasan visited Gujarat and other states without even informing Yadav.

The Railway Board even considered a proposal to fund the project on the lines of the Cochin International Airport Ltd, the first airport in the country to operate under a public-private partnership with a robust stakeholder base of 19,000 investors, mostly non-resident Indians.

At that time, the estimated cost for the Ahmedabad-Mumbai route was ₹25,000 crore.

Sivadasan and his peers hail the Gujarat trip as the turning point for the project. The state government, under the then Chief Minister Narendra Modi, not only promised its unconditional support but also approved ₹10 crore for a feasibility study in Gujarat within a matter of hours.

Railway veterans say this sowed the seeds of the flagship Bullet Train project of the Bharatiya Janata Party government under Prime Minister Modi when he took charge in 2014.

As Batra signed off from the Railway Board in 2007, the project went off track. Two years later, though, socialist leader Yadav took a bullet train journey between Tokyo and Kyoto.