Bengaluru, 9 Feb

State Minister MB Patil on Friday said the Bengaluru Suburban Railway Project (BSRP) is expected to be completed by December 2027.

The Minister was speaking to reporters here at the signing of the MoU between State  government and the KfW Development Bank of Germany for funding the BSRP project. The bank will lend Rs 4,561 crore at an annual interest rate of four per cent interest for 20 years.

N Manjula, Managing Director of K-RIDE (Rail Infrastructure Development Company-Karnataka), which is the nodal agency to complete the project, and Wolf Muth, Country Director, KFW Development Bank signed and exchanged the documents in the presence of Patil, who holds the infrastructure development portfolio.

This is the supplementary agreement between Germany's KfW Development Bank and K-RIDE followed by the primary agreement on 15 December, 2023 between the Department of Economic Affairs of the Government of India and KfW for the disbursal of Rs 4,561 crore.

According to him, the funding is for Corridor-1 from Bengaluru City Railway Station to Devanahalli and Corridor-3 from Kengeri to Whitefield. "We have not yet started Corridor-1 and Corridor-3 for want of funds. Now that we have got funds we will take up the project," the minister explained.

Corridor-1 has been split into two parts. The first part from Yelahanka to Devanahalli will be finished by December 2026 while Bengaluru City to Yelahanka will be completed by December 2027. The Minister also underlined that the BSRP will not compete with the Metro Rail project but complement it. He also promised to resolve the land acquisition issue pertaining to the Corridor-1 and Corridor-3.

 The loan will also be utilised for the works of Corridor-4 (Heelalige to Rajanukunte) Station work, Depot-1 (Devanahalli), S&T Signal & Telecom), PSD Platform Screen Door), AFC (Automatic Fare Collection), Solar Panel and Security Equipment, MMI (Man Machine Interface).

Manjula said, "The project has been planned like the Metro. It has been designed to have a train service every 90 seconds. The operational issues will be decided on the passenger footfall." The time limit of December 2027 is contradictory to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s 40-month deadline to finish the Bengaluru Suburban Rail Project, which pegged the completion date as December 2025.

While laying the foundation stone of BSRP in Bengaluru in June 2022, the Prime Minister had said that "what had not happened in the past 40 years will be completed in the next 40 months".  BSRP,  sanctioned through the Ministry of Railways for a project cost of Rs 15,767 crore, aims to develop a  suburban railway network of 148 km with 58 stations along four corridors.  PTI/ANI