An Indian court rejected Godrej & Boyce Manufacturing Co Ltd’s plea against the government acquiring its land for the nation’s first bullet train, helping fasttrack the project that has seen inordinate delays.
(Bloomberg) — An Indian court rejected Godrej & Boyce Manufacturing Co Ltd’s plea against the government acquiring its land for the nation’s first bullet train, helping fasttrack the project that has seen inordinate delays.
A two-judge panel of the Bombay High Court dismissed the petition challenging land acquisition for Mumbai-Ahmedabad high-speed rail, ruling the project was in the larger public interest and a “dream” for the country.
The project initially pegged at 1.08 trillion rupees ($13 billion) is funded by Japan International Cooperation Agency and covers a track of 508 kilometers (316 miles). A segment of this was proposed on the land owned by Godrej but the engineering company challenged it arguing the compensation of 2.64 billion rupees offered by the government was low.
The bullet train is part of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s ambitious plan to modernize India’s 170-year-old rail infrastructure. The 200 miles-per-hour train will cut the travel time between financial hub of Mumbai and Ahmedabad, a city in Modi’s home state of Gujarat, to a fourth. The project has faced legal troubles in the past too, leading to time and cost overruns.
The ownership of the land remained with Godrej as the case was being fought in the court, while the government completed the acquisition of all other land blocks for the project. The ruling paves the way for the government to take control of the remaining land, but Godrej still has the option to approach the country’s top court.
The company requested the court to halt the operation of this judgment for a period of two weeks but the request was denied.
(Updates with more details in the last paragraph. An earlier version of the story corrected the bullet train’s travel time.)
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