Almost a year after it was first talked about, Indian Railways have finally taken the initial step towards exploring the idea of setting up High Speed Rail Corridors (HSRC) for passenger trains in India.

The Railway Ministry has recently invited global bids to appoint a consultant to conduct a pre-feasibility study to set up an HSRC between Delhi-Chandigarh-Amritsar.

The consultant’s task will essentially envisage preparing a detailed pre-feasibility report for setting up an elevated corridor equipped to handle trains moving at speeds in excess of 300 kmph on the 450-kilometre long Delhi-Chandigarh-Amritsar route.

The Railways has selected four more routes to get the pre-feasibility studies conducted and are likely to call for bids to appoint consultants to conduct studies for them. The routes include Pune-Mumbai-Ahmedabad, Hyderabad-Dornakal-Vijaywada-Chennai, Howrah-Haldia and Chennai-Bangalore-Coimbatore-Ernakulam.

Rail Bhavan is excited over the fact that almost all the major states — Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra, Gujarat, Haryana, Punjab, Kerala, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Delhi and West Bengal — have expressed their interest in high speed trains and have agreed “in principle” to participate in any pre-feasibility studies.