Government works to develop 500 stations under PPP mode

Mumbai, June 30 (IANS) Railway Minister Suresh Prabhu has said the government is working on a plan to develop 500 railway stations with local tourism potential under public-private partnership (PPP) mode.

Addressing the Annual General Meeting (AGM) of Indian Merchants Chamber late on Thursday, Prabhu said the Indian Railways was exploring methods and means to monetise the huge railway properties and effective land usage for raising finances to offer better travel experience to passengers.

As part of the endeavour, world-class railway stations are being developed at Gandhinagar and Surat (Gujarat) and Habibganj at Bhopal (Madhya Pradesh).

Later, delivering the 13th D.R. Gadgil Memorial Lecture, organised by the Maharashtra Economic Development Council (MEDC), Prabhu called for greater private investment in the civil sector to boost growth.

"Corporates can change everything, but the problem is that private investment in the civil sector is not increasing," he said.

Prabhu said though the Gross Domestic Product (GDP) was growing in the current economic scenario, the contribution of the manufacturing sector was hardly significant, as nearly two-thirds of the GDP was being generated by the services sector and "this needs to change".

He said strengthening the cooperative sector and giving it a boost would be a fitting tribute to Gadgil, whose biggest contribution to the country was his role in establishing the sugar cooperatives in Maharashtra.

"We have observed that the cooperative sector can bring about a change in the country's economy, especially where more than half the population depends on agriculture. Partnerships between cooperatives and corporates can bring about a great change and hugely boost the Indin economy," Prabhu added.

On the occasion, MEDC President Dipak Naik and Bombay Stock Exchange MD and CEO Ashish Kumar Chauhan announced signing of an MoU to share data with each other on unemployment, indices of consumer sentimens, research reports pertaining to consumer information and indices of various Indian states, a first for the Exchange.