 "Metro trains on trial run between Mittuguda and Nagole, in Hyderabad on Friday, December 18, 2015 PTI")
The Public Investment Board (PIB) of the Union Finance Ministry has cleared Pune Merto Rail project on Friday in a meeting held at New Delhi. Now, the proposal will be forwarded to the union cabinet for a final nod before it is implemented.
"The Metro is an important issue for the city. PIB has approved Pune metro rail project in a meeting held at Delhi. We are expecting final approval from union government very soon. This will help to speed up the project and will be a major growth engine for Pune's development," said Anil Shirole, Member of Parliament from Pune.
For Metro Rail Project, World Bank and Asian Infrastructure Investment (AII) Bank have sanctioned an amount of Rs 6,325.50 crore.
After the Pune Metro Rail project plan was proposed to the Ministry of Urban Development, the project was then referred to Department of Economic Affairs, GoI. This was discussed at the steering committee meeting of DoEA. The DoEA then gave approval to raise 50 per cent loan amount from two institutes. Both WB and AII Bank will contribute 50-50 to the loan amount,
Other than the 50 per cent funds coming from WB and AII Bank, 20 per cent funds will come from the Centre and State, each and rest of 10 per cent will be contributed by two municipalities of the city. So far the Centre has sanctioned Rs 2,118 crore, State Government has committed Rs 2,460 crore and both the city corporations-Pune Municipal Corporation and Pimpri-Chinchwad Municipal Corporation-will sanction a total of Rs 1,278.10 crore for the project.
The Delhi Metro Rail Corporation had submitted the proposal for Pune Metro rail in 2009 estimating the project cost to be Rs 7,984 crore, which was revised in 2015 with new estimate to Rs 11,522 crore.
The Pune Metro plan was submitted to the public investment board in 2014. The total proposed length of the metro in Pune is 31.51 km. It will run on two corridors the first 16.59 km between Pimpri Chinchwad Municipal Corporation and Swargate and the second 14.92 km from Vanaz to Ramwadi.
