By Enersider Desk | New Delhi
Ostensibly with an eye on upcoming state assembly elections in West Bengal, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman in her ninth budget speech laid emphasis on infrastructure development by announcing establishment of new Dedicated Freight Corridors connecting Dankuni in the East, to Surat in the West.
FM also announced operationalising 20 new National Waterways (NW) over next 5 years, starting with NW-5 in Odisha to connect mineral rich areas of Talcher and Angul and industrial centres like Kalinga Nagar to the Ports of Paradeep and Dhamra.
The development of an integrated East Coast Industrial Corridor with a well-connected node at Durgapur in West Bengal was also announced in the budget speech along with creation of five tourism destinations in the five Purvodaya States, and the provision of 4,000 e-buses.
FM also announced a Scheme for Development of Buddhist Circuits in Arunachal Pradesh, Sikkim, Assam, Manipur, Mizoram and Tripura. The Scheme will cover preservation of temples and monasteries, pilgrimage interpretation centers, connectivity and pilgrim amenities.
These announcements are part of the Union Government’s focus on the Purvodaya States and the North-Eastern Region.
Purvodaya, or “Rise of the East,” is a government initiative aimed at accelerating the development of five key eastern Indian states—Bihar, Jharkhand, West Bengal, Odisha, and Andhra Pradesh.
“With a clear focus on connectivity, manufacturing depth, and regional balance, the Budget outlines a decisive push to build world-class, future-ready infrastructure,” Union Minister for Road Transport and Highways Nitin Gadkari said after the Budget speech.
FM in her speech said, “Aligning with the roadmap launched in December 2025, Carbon Capture Utilization and Storage (CCUS) technologies at scale will achieve higher readiness levels in end-use applications across five industrial sectors, including, power, steel, cement, refineries and chemicals. An outlay of ₹20,000 crore is proposed over the next 5 years.”
In order to promote environmentally sustainable passenger systems, we will develop seven High-Speed Rail corridors between cities as ‘growth connectors’, namely i) Mumbai-Pune, ii) Pune-Hyderabad, iii) Hyderabad-Bengaluru, iv) Hyderabad-Chennai, v) Chennai-Bengaluru, vi) Delhi-Varanasi, vii) Varanasi-Siliguri, FM said.
The FM also announced a Scheme for Enhancement of Construction and Infrastructure Equipment (CIE) will be introduced to strengthen domestic manufacturing of high-value and technologically-advanced CIE. This can range from lifts in a multi-story apartment, fire-fighting equipment, large and small, to tunnel-boring equipment for building metros and high-altitude roads.
A Scheme for Container Manufacturing to create a globally competitive container manufacturing ecosystem, with a budgetary allocation of ₹10,000 crore over a 5 year period was also announced in the budget.
