Construction work of the Hyderabad Metro Rail's second phase will begin once bids are finalised for the Airport Metro Express from Raidurg to Rajiv Gandhi International Airport at Shamshabad.
Hyderabad Metro Rail Workshop Areas | Representational Image, Credit: Hyderabad Metro Rail
Hyderabad: Almost six years after the launch Hyderabad Metro Rail, the twin cities of Hyderabad and Secunderabad will now finally see progress in construction of the much-awaited second phase. Work will begin once bids are finalised for the Airport Metro Express from Raidurg to Rajiv Gandhi International Airport at Shamshabad.
Hyderabad Airport Metro Express will be a 31-km elevated stretch with on ground and an underground section. The estimated cost for the project is Rs 6,250 crore.
Telangana government took over five years to start work on the second phase of Hyderabad metro Rail. The proposal was cleared early 2018 itself and Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao laid the foundation stone for the project in December last year.
Budget allocations had been announced but the work did not see any progress even after the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) prepared a detailed project report.
The Airport Metro will reduce travel time from the city to the airport by up to 50 per cent. The metro is expected to take just 20 minutes to connect the airport to Hyderabad.
What makes the Airport Metro Express unique is that unlike other metro network's in India, it will be funded entirely by the government under EPC (engineering, procurement and construction) mode.
This decision came after the metro rail failed to attract any bidders from among infrastructure firms despite offering attractive terms — much better than what was offered to the L&T Metro Rail Hyderabad (L&TMRH) for the first phase in 2010.
In the first phase as well, Central government's contribution was capped at Rs 1,458 crore, just 10 per cent of the Viability Gap Funding, officials said adding that Rs254 crore of the amount is still due.
A State Bank of India-led consortium of public sector banks had loaned about Rs 11,000 crore to the metro project built under the public, private partnership (PPP) mode, the only such in the country.
