India-Switzerland decide to keep working together in railway sector

India and Switzerland have decided to carry forward working together in the Rail Transport sector, Ministry of Railways said in a statement on Tuesday.

"The two sides at meetings that concluded last evening have followed upon the 1st meeting of Joint Working Group (JWG) held between two sides after the MoU for cooperation in rail sector was signed in 2017," it said in its statement.

The Indian side was led by the Minister of Railways and Commerce and Industry, Piyush Goyal at these high-level delegation-level meetings while the Swiss delegation comprising Swiss Officials from Department of Transport and representatives from Swiss companies was led by Simonetta Sommaruga, Federal Councilor and Head of the Federal Department of the Environment, Transport, Energy and Communications.

According to the official statement, the Swiss Federal Councilor thanked Goyal for the prompt response in arranging and interactive session with the delegation and the representatives of Swiss companies working in the area of Rail Transport to showcase their expertise and new products.

"Piyush Goyal, while thanking the Swiss delegation, impressed upon the Make-in-India to enable their products to be competitive in India and use it as a platform for the global market. He directed that issues raised by Swiss companies in respect of expeditious clearance at RDSO and development of new products should be resolved and clarified by the Railway Board," the statement added.

The discussions in Joint Working Group focused on Freight and Passenger Cars, Railway Electrification Equipments, Multimodal transport and tunneling technology. It was also agreed during the meeting that a regular system of follow-up will be institutionalised to monitor the progress of interactions and implementation in a time-bound manner.