High-Speed Rail

India's first bullet train — the 508-km Mumbai–Ahmedabad corridor — was agreed with Japan in 2015 using Shinkansen technology, with its foundation stone laid in 2017. With a design speed of 350 km/h and an operating speed of 320 km/h, it will connect the two cities in about 1 hour 58 minutes.

By July 2026, 452 km of piers and 356 km of girders were in place, 17 river bridges had been completed by February 2026, and 4.8 km had been dug of the ~21-km tunnel that includes India's first undersea rail section beneath Thane Creek. The first service is expected in August 2027; the Railways say a completion date for the full line can be fixed only once all works and trainsets are ready.

India's first bullet train, the 508-km Mumbai–Ahmedabad corridor, is being built with Japanese Shinkansen technology and largely Japanese (JICA) soft loans. It runs on a dedicated corridor, about 90% of it elevated — no level crossings, no shared lines — allowing an operating speed of 320 km/h. The knowledge and skills from this first project are meant to seed a wider network of high-speed corridors India can build itself.

The flagship corridor is costly (about ₹1.08 lakh crore) and land acquisition pushed it years past its original date — the first service is now expected in August 2027. The real question is whether the economics justify extending high-speed rail to more corridors (Budget 2026-27 named seven more, including Delhi–Varanasi and Chennai–Bengaluru), and how much of the technology India can localise to bring costs down.

508 km; 320 km/h operating (350 design); Shinkansen; ₹1.08 lakh crore sanctioned; 356 km of girders (July 2026); first undersea rail tunnel; first service expected August 2027. Source: Ministry of Railways (PIB, Lok Sabha).