Transport in India consists of transport by land, water and air. Road transport is the primary mode of transport for most Indian citizens, and India's road transport systems are among the most heavily used in the world.India's road network is the second-largest, after the United States, and one of the busiest in the world, transporting 8.225 billion passengers and over 980 million tonnes of cargo annually, as of 2015. India's rail network is the fourth largest and second busiest in the world, transporting 8.09 billion passengers and 1.20 billion tonnes of freight annually, as of 2020. Aviation in India is broadly divided into military and civil aviation which is the fastest-growing aviation market in the world (IATA data).India's waterways network, in the form of rivers, canals, backwaters and creeks, is the ninth largest waterway network in the world. Freight transport by waterways is highly under utilised in India with the total cargo moved (in tonne kilometres) by inland waterways being 0.1 percent of the total inland traffic in India. In total, about 21 percent of households have two wheelers whereas 4.70 percent of households in India have cars or vans as per the 2011 census of India. The automobile industry in India is currently rapidly growing with an annual production of over 4.6 million vehicles, with an annual growth rate of 10.5% and vehicle volume is expected to rise greatly in the future.
The total road network in India is 6.37 mn km comprising all categories of roads - national & state highways and urban & rural roads which is the second largest in the world. National Highways (NH) account for 2% of the total road network and carry over 40% of total traffic.
There has been a consistent increase in the construction of National Highways, with 13,327 kms being constructed in 2020-21, from 4,410 km of NH construction in 2014-15.
India has a well-developed framework for Public-Private-Partnerships (PPP) in the highway sector. Asian Development Bank ranked India at the first spot in PPP operational maturity and also designated India as a developed market for PPPs.
In the last 7 years, the length of NHs has gone up by more than 50% from 91,287 km, as on April 2014, to 1,40,152 km now. The pace of construction has increased more than 3 times, from 12 km per day in 2014-15 to 37 km per day in 2020-21.
The Government has set an ambitious target in Budget 2022-23 of expanding the National Highway network by 25,000 kms over the fiscal year. Ministry of Roads & Highways overall target to develop 2 lakh Kms of National Highway Network by 2025.
The BharatMala Pariyojana, launched in 2017, aims to build about 65,000 km of national and economic corridors, border and coastal roads, and expressways, to optimize the efficiency of already built highway infrastructure. It is envisaged that the programme will provide 4-lane connectivity to 550 districts, develop 50 economic corridors of about 26,000 km, increase the vehicular speed by 20-25%, reduce the supply chain costs by 5-6%, and improve the NH network to carry 70-80% of total road traffic. The first phase of the programme will develop 34,800 km of highways, at an estimated outlay of INR 5,35,000 crore.
100% FDI in roads and highways is allowed under automatic route.
The government has forecasted an investment of $350 bn towards road infrastructure in the North-East region of India during 2020-2025.
The market for roads and highways in India is projected to exhibit a CAGR of 36.16% during 2016-2025, on account of growing government initiatives to improve transportation infrastructure in the country. For the period of 2016-17 to 2021-22, the CAGR stands at 20%.
The highways sector in India has been at the forefront of performance and innovation. The government has successfully rolled out over 60 road projects in India worth over $10 bn based on the Hybrid Annuity Model (HAM). HAM has balanced risk appropriately between private and public partners and boosted PPP activity in the sector.
Asset recycling, through the toll-operate-transfer (ToT) model has been taken up by the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) for 100 highways. The first two bundles of 9 highways each were monetized successfully for an investment of over $2 bn.
As one of the biggest reforms in the road transportation industry in India, the NHAI has gone ‘Fully Digital’, with the launch of a unique cloud-based and Artificial Intelligence-powered Big Data Analytics platform – Data Lake and Project Management Software. The entire project management work flow of NHAI is transformed from manual to online portal based, wherein the complete project execution operations including ‘workflow with time lines’ and ‘alert mechanism’ have been configured. All project documentation, contractual decisions and approvals are now being done through portal only.
The above data shows the trend of road development in kilometer in recent years.
| National highway | state highway | Other Roads |
|---|---|---|
| 1,40,995 Km | 1,71,039 Km | 60,59,813 Km |
Indian Railways (IR) is a statutory body under the ownership of Ministry of Railways, Government of India that operates India's national railway system. It manages the fourth largest national railway system in the world by size, with a total route length of 68,103 km (42,317 miles) as of 31 March 2022. 52,247 km (32,465 mi) or 83% of all the broad-gauge routes are electrified with 25 kV 50 Hz AC electric traction as of 1 April 2022.
In 2020, Indian Railways carried 808.6 crore (8.086 billion) passengers and in 2022, Railways transported 1418.1 million tonnes of freight. It runs 13,169 passenger trains daily, on both long-distance and suburban routes, covering 7,325 stations across India. Mail or Express trains, the most common types of trains, run at an average speed of 50.6 km/h (31.4 mph). Suburban EMUs run at an average speed of 37.5 km/h (23.3 mph). Ordinary passenger trains (incl. mixed) run at an average speed of 33.5 km/h (20.8 mph). The maximum speed of passenger trains varies, with the Vande Bharat Express running at a peak speed of 180 km/h (110 mph).
In the freight segment, IR runs 8,479 trains daily. The average speed of freight trains is around 42.2 km/h (26.2 mph). The maximum speed of freight trains varies from 60–75 km/h (37–47 mph) depending on their axle load with 'container special' trains running at a peak speed of 100 km/h (62 mph).
As of March 2020, Indian Railways' rolling stock consisted of 2,93,077 freight wagons, 76,608 passenger coaches and 12,729 locomotives. IR owns locomotive and coach-production facilities at several locations in India. It had 1.254 million employees as of March 2020, making it the world's eighth-largest employer. The government has committed to electrifying India's entire rail network by 2023–24, and becoming a "net zero (carbon emissions) railway" by 2030.
| State/Union territory | Route kilometer |
|---|---|
| Andhra Pradesh | 3,965 Km |
| Arunachal pradesh | 12 Km |
| Assam | 2,519 Km |
| Bihar | 3,794 Km |
| Chattisgarh | 1,152 Km |
| Delhi | 184 Km |
| Goa | 69 Km |
| Gujurat | 5,301 Km |
| Harayana | 1,703 Km |
| Himachal pradesh | 312 Km |
| Jammu and Kashmir | 298 Km |
| Jharkand | 2,596 Km |
| Karnataka | 3,542 Km |
| Kerala | 6,083 Km |
| Madhya pradesh | 5,148 Km |
Finally, India is still expected to develop its Road and Railway infrastructure to maximum capacity in coming years.