November 18, 2017 TnH Global

Narendra Modi to inaugurate Hyderabad metro rail on November 28

The first phase of the project covers a distance of 30 km in two corridors has taken five years to build.

Hyderabad is set to become the latest Indian city to have a metro railway system with Prime Minister Narendra Modi scheduled to inaugurate the elevated Hyderabad metro rail project on November 28. Hyderabad Metro Rail Limited (HMRL) sources said Modi will unveil a pylon at Miyapur metro rail station, the first point on the Mumbai-Hyderabad national highway, to mark the inauguration of the first phase of the project covering a distance of 30 km in two corridors.

The entire metro rail project stretches for 72 km in three corridors. Later, the prime minister will watch a presentation of digital images of the evolution of the railway system in Hyderabad from the days of the Nizam State Railways to the elevated Metro Rail project. He is expected to travel in the metro train for a distance of 13 km along with state governor ESL Narasimhan, chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao and other officials.

The project will be thrown open to the public two hours after the formal inauguration, sources said.

“We are all ready with all the arrangements for the inauguration. We are just awaiting the final itinerary of the Prime Minister,” a top official of the HMRL said.

Modi will be in the city to inaugurate the three-day Global Entrepreneurship Summit being organised by the US government in collaboration with Niti Ayog, at Hyderabad International Convention Centre in the evening.

One of the biggest metro rail projects in public-private participation (PPP) mode, the 72-km long metro rail project commenced in April 2012 at an initial estimated cost of Rs 14,000 crore. As per the latest estimates, the cost has gone up to over Rs 18,500 crore. The project is being executed by Larsen and Toubro.

Telangana IT minister K T Rama Rao said the state government had sanctioned Rs 3,000 crore to the Hyderabad Metro rail project of which Rs 2,240 crore had been spent so far. The Centre was providing Viability Gap Funding of Rs 1,458 crore and had so far released an amount of Rs 958 crore.

The minister said the State government was also considering taking up Phase II of HMR. The exercise for preparing detail project report for the same would commence shortly.