PM Modi, Shinzo Abe will launch India's first bullet train project in Ahmedabad today

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe is currently on a tour to India and is also set to participate in the 12th annual India-Japan summit in Ahmedabad.

He along with Prime Minister Narendra Modi will lay the foundation stone for the proposed $ 17 billion high-speed Ahmedabad-Mumbai Rail Network, commonly known as the bullet train, on Thursday in Ahmedabad.

Further, he will also sign various agreements on strategic, financial and development cooperation between the two countries. The bullet train, which has a capacity to accommodate 750 people, is expected to reduce travel time between the two cities from seven to three hours.

The target for the completion of the project is December 2023, though officials say there are indications that the government may seek an earlier deadline of 2022.

The train will stop at each of the 12 railway stations on the route, but only for 165 seconds. A 21-km-long tunnel will be dug between Boisar and BKC in Mumbai, of which seven km will be under water.

The entire line will be at an elevation of around 20 m which will reduce land acquisition.“This technology will revolutionize and transform the transport sector,” said Railways Minister Piyush Goyal, welcoming the prospects for growth brought by Japan’s high-speed “shinkansen” technology.

Japan is providing 81 percent of the funding for the 1.08-trillion-rupee ($16.9-billion) project, through a 50-year loan at 0.1 percent annual interest.

India would make “all-out efforts” to complete the line by August 2022, more than a year earlier than planned, the government said this week.