Railway projects face cost overrun of 1.5 lakh crore; cost escalation by 148%

Railway projects account for over 60% of the 331 central sector projects that are facing cost overrun of Rs 1.5 lakh crore due to various reasons.

A total 202 projects of railways are facing total cost overrun of Rs 1.5 lakh crore, as per the flash report of the Ministry of Statistics and Programme Implementation for July, 2017.

The statistics ministry monitors central sector projects envisaging an expenditure of Rs 150 crore and above each on regular basis.

According to the report, the total original cost of these 202 projects was Rs 1,05,424.13 crore. The total anticipated cost of these projects is estimated at Rs 2,55,634.29 crore which indicates overall cost escalation by 142.48%.

The ministry monitored 350 projects of Indian Railways in July this year.

The study stated that as many as 33 projects of Railways out of the monitored 350 projects reported time overrun or delay of 12 months to 261 months.

After railways, power sector reported second highest incidence of overall cost overrun. Out of the 125 projects monitored by Statistics Ministry in the power sector, 43 reported cost overrun of Rs 52,933.93 crore.

The total original cost of these 43 projects was Rs 89,432.27 crore which escalated to total anticipated cost of Rs 1,42,366.20 crore.

The report stated that out of the 125 power sector projects, 59 reported time overrun (delay) of 5 months to 134 months