L&T inks agreement with NHSRCL for bullet train station

The National High Speed Rail Corporation Ltd (NHSRCL) inked an agreement worth Rs 2,460.88 crore with construction major Larsen & Toubro (L&T) for the design and development of about 8 km of a viaduct. The contract also includes a high-speed rail (HSR) or bullet train station in Vadodara in Gujarat for the Mumbai-Ahmedabad High Speed Rail (MAHSR) corridor.

With this NHSRCL has successfully awarded 100 per cent civil contracts for the construction of MAHSR alignments in Gujarat, including eight HSR stations and two rolling stock depots at Sabarmati and Surat.

"To ensure seamless integration with the railways, the Vadodara HSR station is planned above the existing platform seven at Vadodara station of the Indian Railways. The integration will facilitate easy movement of passengers between HSR and Indian Railways stations," NHSRCL spokesperson Sushma Guar told Business Today.

The under-construction 508-km long Mumbai-Ahmedabad High Speed Rail Corridor is the country's first bullet train project to connect India's financial capital of Mumbai with Gujarat's commercial hub Ahmedabad. Of the total project length, 348-km lies in the state of Gujarat, 4-km in the union territory of Dadra & Nagar Haveli and the rest 156-km in the state of Maharashtra. The Japan International Cooperation Agency (JICA) is funding Rs 88,000 crore of the estimated Rs 110,000 crore budget.

Launched in September 2017 by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his Japanese counterpart Shinzo Abe, the project was initially expected to be completed by 2023. However, owing to delays in land acquisition in Maharashtra and the countrywide lockdown announced in March 2021 to contain the first wave of the Covid-19 pandemic, the deadline is now extended to 2028. As of date, 98.63 per cent of land acquisition has happened in Gujarat, 100 per cent in Dadra & Nagar Haveli and 60.2 per cent in Maharashtra.

The trial run of the first bullet train would happen on the 50-km stretch between Surat and Bilimora in 2026, the country's railway ministry has said.