Railway tweaks Gati Shakti Cargo terminal policy

Railway Board has revised the Gati Shakti Multi-Modal Cargo Terminal (GCT) policy to increase private sector participation in setting up cargo terminals along rail freight corridors with flexible bidding norms and allowing unused railway assets under the new policy.   

According to the policy, the revision was necessitated to make it more participative and attracting more investment. GCTs are along the railway sidings for faster movement of goods and cutting own cost.

A former senior railway board officials said that the revised changes are significant for increasing participation of customers.

The implementation of the GCT, 2026 issued last week depends on zonal railways.

“However, Railway Board instructions are not uniformly followed by zonal railways, especially in case of private sidings leading to delays and extra costs,” the official added.

Indian Railways has approved proposals for 306 GCTs to facilitate development of cargo terminals. So far, 118 new GCTs have been commissioned with mobilisation of Rs 8,600 crore of private investment since the policy came into effect in December 2021

Importance

Indian Railways main source of earnings is from freight and sidings contribute nearly 80%, as coal loading areas are also part of private sidings with biggest customers -- Coal India, NTPC, SAIL, Tisco and Ultratech, among others.

The new policy has an interesting clause that Railway Board has right to change bidding parameters if some better model of revenue generation is suggested. It also permits zonal railways to utilise assets not being used under this policy till now like unused good sheds or railway lines.

The revised streamlines procedure for brown field sidings wanting to shift to GCT. Earlier they had to ensure that there are no dues or legal cases with Railways now only the terminal/sidings which they want to opt for GCT should be free of legal cases.

“Even if there is a legal case and railways have appealed, customer can opt for conversion to GCT after giving an affidavit that they will adhere to court ruling,” said the official, who has closely handled the GCT implementation.

To cut down on inordinate delays, the policy has now set definite timelines, which were only indicative before, like clearance by Chief Engineer/Planning & Design Department to be done in two weeks and Singal Interlocking Plan (SIP) to be cleared within four weeks.

 “These delays cause price increase and irritation to customers. It also has been clarified that date for construction will begin after encumbrance free land has been provided to GCT Operator,” the official further explained.

It has also been clarified that GCTO can give refusal to access to value added services like silo usage which are primarily used for food grain or cement storage, preventing commodity contamination.

The idea behind GCTs was to bring more cargo to railways and reducing the logistics costs. Indian Railways share in overall logistics is around 27% despite being the cheapest mode of transport compared to road, which has a major share of 65%.