Western Dedicated Freight Corridor Reaches JNPT, Boosting Maharashtra Logistics
The Western Dedicated Freight Corridor (WDFC) reached Jawaharlal Nehru Port Authority (JNPA) on Tuesday, with Prime Minister Narendra Modi flagging off freight trains on the route and marking the inauguration of a key link between northern India and the western coast.
Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis said the completion of the corridor’s important final section would strengthen the state’s logistics and maritime capacity. Deputy Chief Ministers Eknath Shinde and Sunetra Pawar, Raigad district guardian minister Bharat Gogawale and legislator Aditi Tatkare were among those present at JNPA.
According to Fadnavis, around Rs 10,000 crore has been invested in the 178-kilometre section located in Maharashtra. The complete freight corridor stretches for approximately 1,500 kilometres through Maharashtra, Gujarat, Rajasthan, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh.
The New Umbergaon–JNPA section was described as the most challenging part of the project. Construction involved difficult terrain around marshlands, hill ranges and the Vaitarna and Ulhas river areas. Engineers used marine-clay embankments and constructed tunnels, bridges and flyovers to complete what was described as the missing link to the port.
The route will allow double-stack container trains to operate, a first for the country according to the chief minister’s statement. The project includes four tunnels, along with hundreds of bridges and viaducts. At Kalamboli, a 110-metre-long flyover girder weighing approximately 1,500 tonnes is being installed without stopping existing rail traffic. Fadnavis described the work as a major engineering achievement.
The inauguration comes as JNPA expands its container-handling operations. The port handles approximately 55 per cent of India’s total container traffic, according to the figures cited by the chief minister. Between April and August, it handled 3.827 million TEUs, recording 15 per cent growth during the period.
Fadnavis said JNPA’s capacity is expected to exceed 10 million TEUs by 2029-30. He also linked the freight corridor’s operation with the proposed Vadhavan Port, which he said would be three times larger than JNPA. The report did not provide an independent capacity figure for Vadhavan Port.
The chief minister also claimed that India’s logistics costs had fallen from 14 per cent to about 10 per cent and said the target was to bring them below 7 per cent once the Western Dedicated Freight Corridor operated at full capacity. These figures were presented in his remarks at the inauguration and were not independently detailed in the report.
The freight corridor is intended to separate a substantial share of goods movement from passenger rail operations, while providing a direct rail connection between northern production and consumption centres and the western maritime gateways. The next operational milestone will be the corridor’s full-capacity deployment and its integration with port expansion at JNPA and the wider Maharashtra logistics network.
