Financial Times · India's first bullet train stumbles over divisions with partner Japan
This report bears out what the editor has argued for years. The bullet train is an example of India's perverse priorities. Indian rail passengers are not clamoring for speed; they lack seats, safety and clean toilets. Unreserved coaches are crammed, and the Balasore collision in 2023, which killed nearly 300 people, showed how thin the safety margins remain.
The project was never commercially viable. About 81 percent of its original cost is a Japanese loan at 0.1 percent interest over 50 years, terms that belonged to the era of near-zero interest rates, now over. Canada, Australia and New Zealand have no high-speed rail, and the United States has no dedicated bullet-train line; they invest in what suits their geography. National ambition is better shown by systems that work for everyone than by an expensive showpiece.
With more than half the work done and the loan tied to the project, India should finish the Mumbai–Ahmedabad line at the lowest possible cost and treat it as a one-off. Plans for more corridors should be canceled, and the money spent instead on collision avoidance and improved signaling across the network, more general-class seats, and clean, well-kept toilets and stations.
