Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw has said that the Centre has allocated a record railway budget of 14 thousand 205 crore rupees for West Bengal in the Union Budget 2026-27. He said that during the UPA regime between 2009 to 2014, the railway budget for the state was only four thousand 300 crore rupees.

 

Replying to supplementaries during Question Hour in the Lok Sabha, Mr Vaishnaw informed that railway projects in West Bengal require four thousand 662 hectares of land, out of which only 27 per cent has been acquired so far. The Minister said there are several railway projects in the State, where the process of land acquisition has not begun yet.

 

Speaking about Maharashtra, the Minister said railway development work is being carried out in a comprehensive manner and railway projects worth one lakh 50 thousand crore rupees are currently underway in the State. He highlighted that the budgetary allocation for railways in Maharashtra is 23 thousand 926 crore rupees, which was only one thousand one hundred crore rupees during the UPA government. Mr Vaishnaw further said that several new projects have also been taken up to connect industrial cities in the State.