Indian Railways Minister Suresh Prabhu has concluded his two-day visit to Singapore where he held several discussions with many governmental and industry leaders on enhancing inflow of funds in various sectors of railways, an official release said on Friday.
Prabhu visited Singapore to participate as a key speaker during the Infrastructure Finance Summit 2015, organised on October 20 by the World Bank in association with the Singaporean government.
During his visit, he met Singapore's Deputy Prime Minister Tharman Shanmugratnam and discussed the challenges being faced by the economies especially due to economic slowdown in China and the pace of new technological developments followed by a luncheon meeting with Foreign Affairs Minister Vivian Balakrishnan where discussions took place on possibilities of collaboration in development of railway stations in India.
Thereafter, Prabhu met Goh Choong Phong and Tan Kai Ping, senior officials of Singapore Airlines in which the minister apprised them with the potential of Indian railways and the various projects such as creating a dedicated freight corridor to reduce the congestion of traffic as well as enhancing the efficiency of the passenger corridor.
He said given the present global economic scenario where US and Japan are not doing well on economic front, Chinese economy is slowing down, India holds a promising future and aims at reaching a double-digit growth in future especially after introduction of the proposed Goods and Services Tax.
Prabhu also met Boon Chin Hau and Sid Chandrasekaran, senior officials of the GIC Infrastructure Group where he proposed participation of the company in upgradation of railway in terms of expansion of existing stations, constructing malls, offices above them, track-laying, creating separate freight and passenger corridors to reduce decongestion etc by adopting equity route and work with Indian companies on zero-risk basis with an assured financial return.
He also met representatives from Temasek Holdings - another investment company and Gopinath Pillai, ambassador-at-large for Singapore and representatives from Land Transport Authority (LTA).