Maha Metro Rail Corporation has resumed work on the Pune Metro rail project after green signal from the state government and the civic body and easing of restrictions imposed during the lockdown. With work stalled for more than a month, the Pune Metro project has missed the target set to start the first five-km stretch by April 2020. Maha Metro has been able to start work immediately as it had made arrangement for around 2,000 labourers working on the project to stay in labour camps across the metro network project sites, Hemant Sonawane, GM, Maha Metro, said. As of now the project is focused on finishing some critical work along the river front, which will have to be finished before the monsoon season begins with rains expected to hit the city on June 7, Sonawane reportedly conveyed.
Work on the structures on the river as well as two railway stations coming up on the river front have resumed. Maha Metro has also decided to make vendor payments for the works that have already been completed, and it does not foresee any cash flow issues. Pune Metro and its contractors — Tata Gulermak, URC Construction, NCC, J Kumar, HCC, Shapoorji Pallonji and AFCONS among them — ensured that majority of their labourers stayed back during the Covid-19 outbreak and only 20% of the labourers returned home to UP, Bihar and West Bengal. Work on the Pune Metro comprising two lines of 32 km started in December 2016 and was to end in 2022.
Commissioning of work on 10 km of Line 1 and Line 2 was to be done in the first half of 2020. Pune Metro had reached the stage of trial run of coaches within a short span of 30 months and was to start technical trail runs and go for regulatory clearances and certification required for starting train operations. Pune Metro comprises line one of 16.589 km from PCMC to Swargate with five underground stations and nine elevated stations. Line 2 is 14.665 km from Vanaaz to Ramwadi with 16 stations. The Pune Metro projects is funded through bilateral loan from European Investment Bank to the tune of 600 million euro and 245 million euro from AFD.