SilverLine debate: Has K-Rail fallen for the trap set by Japan?

The second SilverLine debate held in Thiruvananthapuram on Wednesday saw a brutal attack on the methods employed by Kerala Rail Development Corporation (K-Rail) to push for the SilverLine semi-high speed project.

This joint venture between Kerala government and the Ministry of Railways was accused of fudging most of the cost estimates in the SilverLine detailed project report (DPR) and of drawing up an alignment without doing the mandatory scientific studies.

Problem was, there was no one from K-Rail to rebut these charges. It is also a fact that many of these charges were raised before and K-Rail had not bothered to set right the concerns. The debate was organised by Janakeeya Pratirodha Samithi. K-Rail refused to participate saying the organisers had not been able to convince it of the fairness and transparency of the discussion.

Former Indian Railway Service officer Alok Kumar Verma, who was also the lead consultant of the SilverLine pre-feasibility study, was the wrecker in chief. "K-Rail is trapped in its own unworkable ideas, " Verma said.

Is SilverLine a vanity project

The former IRS officer said making a standalone rail on standard gauge and locating the new stations away from the city were unviable concepts. The SilverLine stations at Thiruvananthapuram, Kollam, Kottayam, Chengannur and Ernakulam were outside the city. "This will result in a drop in ridership," Verma said.

He said that even Subodh Jain, former member of Indian Railways who had argued for the project in the first debate, had said that the daily ridership would only be 30,000. The DPR had said it would be 80,000 right from the start. Subodh's argument was that the ridership would pick up in time.

IT expert Joseph C Mathew, who was kept out of the first debate, said that the estimated per kilometre charge for SilverLine was Rs 3.90.

"But this is the rate if the project is completed in 2025 and there are 80,000 daily passengers as stated in the DPR," Mathew said. "Even this would mean that you would have to shell out Rs 1,600 for travelling from Thiruvananthapuram to Ernakulam and Rs 3,500 for travelling from Thiruvananthapuram to Kozhikode. This makes it impossible for even a government employee to use the train even once a week," he said.

Mathew said SilverLine could never be called a public transport project. "The CPM had dubbed Prime Minister Narendra Modi's pet Mumbai-Ahmedabad bullet train project elitist. SilverLine is similar in nature," he said.

Further, Mathew said the DPR itself stated that the average travel distance, or the average distance a passenger would travel, was 200 km. "The DPR also says that 37 trains will run in one direction. The maximum number of passengers this train can accommodate is 625. So even if it runs in full capacity, it can take only 46,000 passengers both ways. The DPR's figure of 80,000 comes from the hope that when one set of passengers step out after 200 km, another set would take their place," Mathew said.

Are K-Rail reports dangerously uncooked?

According to Alok Verma, most of the DPR figures are fudged and were arrived at hastily. He said the feasibility study, which should have been done in two years, was completed in 50 days. "It was this report that was done in violation of the engineering code of the Indian Railways that was given in-principle approval by the Ministry of Railways," he said, and added: "The approval itself is illegitimate and should be withdrawn."

Verma said the DPR, which ideally should take three years, was prepared in six months. Environmentalist Sridhar Radhakrishnan termed the rapid environmental impact assessment (EIA) done as part of the DPR as "substandard". "Even K-Rail has acknowledged that it was done by an unrecognised agency," he said.

Sridhar said that over 70% of the mandatory content that had to go into the making of a DPR was absent in the case of SilverLine's.

Even Isaac P Kuncheria, former Digital University Vice Chancellor and a project supporter, said the DPR could be called only a "feasibility report and nothing more".

Verma cited one of the notable omissions. He said there was no rate analysis. "The cost estimates for the construction of tunnels, viaducts and embankments were arbitrarily fixed," Verma said.

Will SilverLine prove too costly for ecology?

This is where environmental concerns came in. Verma said the alignment was fixed without doing any hydrological studies. "A geological investigation has to be carried out to prepare a continuous profile of the ground. Instead, they did a geotechnical study, collecting samples from 120 isolated locations. Even then the DPR itself says that 93% of the alignment is on weak ground," Verma said.

But when they drew up the cost estimate for embankments, it was said that 80% of the stretch is on strong ground and the NITI Aayog objected. Taking into consideration the soil condition in Kerala, it said the cost would be twice the estimate," Verma said.

Sridhar said costs for bridges and viaducts were underestimated by 75%.

But the masking of ecological dangers, it was said, was graver. Joseph C Mathew said that at certain areas the embankment, which at certain points rises up to 17 metres or 55 ft, cuts right through the middle of areas that were inundated during the 2018 floods. "Before laying boundary markers, K-Rail should first show the public the areas where flood waters had spread in 2018 using a simulation model," Mathew said.

Is standard gauge a Japanese trap?

The standard versus broad gauge debate spilled over into the second debate. Last time, Railway expert and project supporter Subodh Jain said standard gauge was the future. He even claimed it could be connected to the Indian broad gauge and achieve interoperability.

Alok Verma said the use of standard gauge would split India's railway network. "We had converted 20,000 km  of metre gauge into broad gauge. Why would we go for standard gauge. Globally, the trend is to create a unified system," Verma said.

European Union, for instance, was trying to convert the broad gauge in Spain and Portugal to standard gauge as all other EU countries run on standard gauge. India, Bangladesh, Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Argentina and even the US use broad gauge.

Like in the case of SilverLine, Verma said broad gauge was first mooted for even the Mumbai-Ahmedabad bullet train and the Chennai-Bangalore semi high-speed rail. This is where Japan came into play.

"They offered this sweetener. They said we will give you loan which you need to repay only after 15 years and can go on paying for the next 50 years," Verma said.

He said Japan was not interested in the viability of the project as they know that their loans had a sovereign guarantees. "Even if the project sinks, they will get their money back," Verma said. Now the Centre has told Kerala that it should fully bear the repayment burden.

What's Japan's links to real estate mafia?

Sridhar made a provocative statement in the course of the debate. "This project is not a transportation project but a land mafia grabbing project," he said.

Raghuchandran Nair, a businessman and a supporter objected. He said it was not unnatural for people with money to purchase some land when a project was announced.

Alok Verma then explained how real estate developers benefit from such Japan-promoted projects. Like India converted from metre to standard gauge, he said Japan converted to standard gauge. Again, like in the case of SilverLine, Japan's new stations were away from city centres like Tokyo and Osaka. "So they promoted real estate development near the new stations so that the main city would gradually spread to the new areas, " Verma said.

Is SilverLine a predatory project?
"I have every reason to believe that this is a predatory project," Sridhar said, elaborating on the elitist nature of the project touched upon earlier by Joseph C Mathew. "This project is coming up by destroying all possibilities available to the common man," he said.

As proof, Sridhar read from a letter written by Union finance minister Nirmala Seetharaman to Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan on January 15, 2021.

Earlier, on August 18, 2020, the Centre had asked Kerala to first complete the projects already in the pipeline before asking for approval for SilverLine.

But the letter Sridhar produced reflected a change of thinking. "After taking note of 12 projects worth Rs 5,900 crore and eight projects in the pipeline worth Rs 37,000 crore, the screening committee (of the Department of Economic Affairs) decided to drop the proposal advising the state government that the existing pipeline projects may be concluded before taking up new projects," Sitharaman's letter said.

According to Sridhar's interpretation, this meant that Kerala government's development projects worth Rs 43,000 crore that were awaiting approval and those that had already secured funding were to be abandoned for the pursuit of SilverLine.

The letter further advises ADB and other lending agencies to utilise these loans (already allotted to Kerala) for some other states where demand exists. "In other words the state government had dumped 20 development projects in favour of SilverLine," he said. Sridhar said he broached the topic to expose the irony of a government that branded anyone who opposed SilverLine as anti-development.

He said the DPR itself stated that any improvement of the existing road and rail network would adversely impact SilverLine's ridership.