IL&FS to prepare report on unused railway land

The railway ministry has appointed Infrastructure Leasing & Financial Services (IL&FS) Ltd as a consultant to prepare a feasibility report on commercial exploitation of land at over 10 sites covering 600 hectares across the country.

The Rail Land Development Authority (RLDA) was set up by the ministry early this year for utilising unused railway land for revenue generating purposes. IL&FS will give its report to RLDA by September this year, based on which the RLDA would decide the land usage""whether it will be leased out for commercial or residential purposes or for both.

Out of the 10 sites, four are situated in and around Kolkata, two near Visakhapatnam and the remaining are in Delhi, Gwalior, Kanpur and Bangalore.

The railway ministry said IL&FS would take into account factors like the geographical locations of these sites, assess the local authority rules and regulations, connectivity, and then evaluate their usage. Also it will fix the lease period for giving land to the private sector.

The railway ministry has approximately 43,000 hectares of unused land. Land which is not required for operational purposes in the foreseeable future would be identified by the zonal railways and the details would be provided to the Railway Board.