Replacing British-era rail bridges may take 60 years

26% bridges are over 100-year old, 5% crossed 140 years

Breaking away from the tradition of having a separate railway budget may have been easy for the government, but replacing British-era railway bridges could take as long as 60 years.

According to estimates, of the 1,36,000 railway bridges in the country, 26 per cent or more than 35,000 are over 100 years old. Of these, 6,000 are 140 year-plus. Sources say as many as 1,15,000 kilometre tracks have also past their prime. 

Going by the current pace of replacing 600 bridges every year, it will take another 58-60 years for the railways to rebuild all the current bridges. The railway ministry