New Delhi, July 25
Over 78 per cent of railway tracks in the country have now been upgraded for speeds of 110 kmph and above, with the improvement in the Indian Railways network carried out in a big way during the last 10 years, Railways Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw informed Parliament on Friday.
The minister said that the measures for track upgradation include the use of 60 kg rails, wider base concrete sleepers, thick web switches, longer rail panels, H Beam sleepers, modern track renewal and maintenance machines,
The track length for the highest speed potential of 130 km per hour & above has been increased more than 4-fold from 5,036 km in 2014 to 23,010 km in 2025, which forms 21.8 per cent of the total track length. Earlier, this high-speed section was only 6.3 per cent of the total length, the minister said in a written reply to a question in the Rajya Sabha.
Similarly, the track length for speeds of 110-130 km per hour has been more than doubled from 26,409 km in 2014 to 59,800 km in 2025, which now constitutes a significant 56.6 per cent of the total track network.