White elephants

Govt must first evaluate the feasibility of bullet trains

This newspaper has reported that the Union government is drawing up plans for seven more high-speed rail routes, which may cost as much as Rs 10 trillion. The routes planned include high-traffic ones like Chennai-Mysore, but also those that appear to be driven by political considerations, such as Delhi-Varanasi. The current “bullet train” project, for a line between Mumbai and Ahmedabad, is expected to cost over Rs 1 trillion — although much of the financing is being obtained at concessional rates from the Japanese financial sector, given that Japanese technology and contractors are being used. The per-kilometre rates being proposed