The MoR has signed an MoC with Japan’s Ministry of Land, Infrastructure, Transport and Tourism on railway safety, which envisages cooperation in the areas of maintenance of tracks and rolling stock. Capacity development has been undertaken as a technical cooperation project under the MoC to develop Indian Railways’ (IR) capacity in these areas.
Further, an MoU has been signed between the MoR and the Federal Department of the Environment, Transport, Energy and Communications of the Swiss Confederation for technical cooperation in the railway sector. The areas of cooperation include traction rolling stock, electric multiple unit and train sets, traction propulsion equipment, freight and passenger cars, tilting trains, railway electrification equipment, train scheduling and operation improvement, railway station modernisation, multimodal transport and tunneling technology.
The MoR has also signed a joint declaration of intent with the German Railways for carrying out a feasibility study to increase the speed of passenger trains to 200 km per hour on the existing 643 km Chennai-Kazipet rail corridor. The cost of the study will be shared equally by the MoR and the German government.