To make the ₹12,000-crore, 374-km long DFC corridor stretch between Sonnagar (Bihar) and Andal (West Bengal) more attractive, the Dedicated Freight Corridor Corporation of India (DFCCIL) has reworked the proposal to de-risk the private concessionaire. The corridor, which was the first public private participation (PPP) project for the DFCCIL, is now proposed to be developed via a design, finance, build, operate and maintain and transfer (DFBOT) model. Managing Director, R.K. Jain, elaborated that stakeholders had expressed apprehension over risks related to construction, finance and revenues under the PPP model, so it has now been decided that the corporation will make payment not on the basis of traffic run in that section, but on the services of the rail system developed by them. If the private concessionaire offers an uptime of 20 hours/day, full payment will be given irrespective of the number of trains run by us or the Indian Railways. The Indian Railways and DFCCIL shall take over the traffic and tariff risk, which will largely reduce the quantum of risk on the part of the concessionaire. The concessionaire shall be responsible for design, construction, finance and operations, and maintenance of the project, he added.
