Davos 2025: Safety tops Indian railways' 2025-26 budget, says Railway Minister

Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw

Safety will continue to be the big ticket item for the Indian Railways' capital expenditure spending in 2025-26, Railway Minister Ashiwini Vaishnaw told Moneycontrol on the sidelines of the World Economic Forum (WEF) meetings in Davos.

Vaishnaw in an interview with Moneycontrol pointed out that safety along with expansion and modernisation will be the ticket items for the Indian Railways' capital expenditure spending after the Budget for 2025-26 is announced on February 1, 2025.

"Safety has been very the most important priority over the last 10 years. In fact, in the last year, our capital expenditure on safety was about Rs 1.8 lakh crores and that is going to continue in FY26," Vaishnaw said.

The Ministry of Railways has spent 76 percent of its allocated budgetary capital expenditure for 2024-25 (FY25) in the first nine months of the financial year, according to estimates from Indian Railways.

Vaishnaw added that he met the Swiss Federal Railways (SBB) delegation and had a detailed discussion on safety technologies and maintenance practices.

"I have spent the whole day with the Swizz Railways understanding their maintenance practises. I learned about how the tracks are maintained, how frequently they replace the tracks, etc," Vaishnaw told Moneycontrol.

As part of his visit to Davos, the railway minister had on January 22 visited Stadler Rail's state-of-the-art manufacturing facility in St Margrethen, Switzerland. India's modernisation plans align with Stadler's expertise in producing double-decker multiple-unit trains.

The railway minister also told Moneycontrol that the Vande Bharat sleeper trains are under testing and will be rolled out soon. He added that the Indian Railways has received positive feedback for its Vande Bharat chair trains. Vaishnaw also said the the Namo Bharat 2.0 will also be launched soon.

The ministry has spent Rs 1.91 trillion from gross budgetary support, Rs 824 crore from external resources, and Rs 8,733 crore from extra-budgetary resources (public-private partnership) on infrastructure creation.

In total, the ministry has spent Rs 2.02 trillion of the budgeted Rs 2.65 trillion as of January 5, a government official said. As of December 31, the railways’ capital expenditure (capex) execution was Rs 4,975 crore more than the previous year.

Of the Rs 2.52 lakh crore allotted to the ministry from the central government coffers, Rs 81,713 crore has been spent on capacity augmentation, which is 68 percent of its allocated budget for new lines, doubling, and expansion works.

Expenditure on safety-related works, such as level crossings, over- and under-bridges, track renewals, bridges and signalling has already reached 82 percent of the allocated budget of Rs 34,414 crore.

Union Budget 2025-26 is expected to hike the gross budgetary support (GBS) to the Ministry of Railways (Indian Railways) by 15-18 percent to around Rs 2.9 lakh crore-Rs 3 lakh crore, officials aware of the ongoing discussions told Moneycontrol.

Last month, the minister underlined the extensive execution of the Kavach safety system and hailed the remarkable progress in station redevelopment efforts. He also observed a significant decrease in the number of accidents that has declined from 345 to 90. About 1.5 lakh posts have been recruited by adopting a streamlined process that is efficient as well as transparent.