New Delhi Mar 31 PTI Delhi Metro does not foresee any major delay or significant cost overrun as to the timelines of the phase 4 project and some of the sections of two of the three priority corridors are planned to be opened by March next year DMRC chief Mangu Singh said on ThursdayThe outgoing managing director of Delhi Metro Rail Corporation DMRC in an interview to PTI also said the final operationalisation of the entire fourth phase of the project may get stretched to March 2025 though the urban transporter is still working with the December 2024 completion timelineThe work on phase IV had begun in December 2019 with a groundbreaking ceremony but it was hit after the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic in March 2020 in Delhi At present the DMRC is undertaking construction work on 652 km of three priority corridors spanning 45 stations under the project -- Janakpuri West-RK Ashram Marg 2892 km Majlis Park-Maujpur 1255 km which are extensions of the already operational Magenta Line and Pink Line and Tughalakabad-Aerocity 2362 km that is being built as Silver Line connecting the operational Violet Line and Airport Line from the respective endsAsked if the pandemic has incurred cost escalation or delay in project timelines of the fourth phase Singh said At this stage I dont foresee any major delay and no major cost overrun either The systems are in place things are moving quite ok and the time loss during the pandemic I am very hopeful we will catch up And maybe within a years time we will start opening the phase 4 sections one by one part by partSo small sections of both Line 7 Pink Line and Line 8 Magenta Line which are being built as part of phase 4 priority corridors would probably be operational in a years time from now or by March 2023 he addedThe Union Cabinet in March 2019 had approved three out of the six corridors of the Delhi Metros phase 4 which will further improve connectivity in the national capitalThe other three proposed corridors which have not yet been approved by the Union Cabinet are Rithala-Bawana-Narela Inderlok-Indraprastha and Lajpat Nagar-Saket G BlockAsked about the status of the remaining three corridors Singh said This is now in the latest stage and Cabinet approval is pending All other formalities are over So Cabinet nod can be sanctioned anytime now Singh had taken over as MD of DMRC on January 1 2012 after his predecessor E Sreedharan handed over the charge to him on December 31 2011Singhs tenure as the managing director of the mass rapid transit system had been extended multiple timesAsked about the financial health of the DMRC in the wake of the three Covid lockdowns which caused losses to the urban transporter he said We are coming back to normal The average daily ridership has crossed 43 lakh which is 70 per cent of the pre Covid figure he added A senior official said the pre-Covid ridership journeys or line utilisation was about 60 lakh DMRC uses the metric of journey or line utilisation which is calculated by the number of corridors passengers use to reach their destinations Asked about the role of technology in the future of DMRC the outgoing chief said All new lines will be with the latest technologies like the DTO Driverless Train Operations and older lines will be converted to modern signalling system as and when the renewal becomes due Therefore the technology will play a very important role for five-six years PTI KND RHL

New Delhi Sep 29 PTI The government has extended the tenure of Mangu Singh as the managing director of the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation till March 31 2022 according to an official order issued on Wednesday The extension comes amid the ongoing work on Phase-IV of the Delhi Metro network as new construction and operations were severely hit earlier due to the coronavirus pandemic and the resultant lockdowns Singhs tenure as MD of DMRC began from January 1 2012 after his predecessor E Sreedharan had handed over charge to him on December 31 2011 according to DMRC website This is the fourth time his tenure as the managing director of the mass rapid transit system has been extended The Govt of NCT of Delhi in accordance with the provisions of Article 130 of the Memorandum and Article of Association of the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation Limited and after obtaining concurrence of the Ministry of Housing Urban Affairs Govt of India vide letter dated 28092021 is pleased to extend the tenure of Shri Mangu Singh as Managing Director of Delhi Metro Rail Corporation Limited up to 31032022 reads the order The order has been issued by the transport department of the Delhi government Delhi Metro services were halted for over five months due to the COVID-19 pandemic During the 169-day period when Metro services were suspended starting March 22 the DMRC had suffered losses worth nearly Rs 1300 crore sources had earlier said Following guidelines issued by the Ministry of Home Affairs the Delhi Metro had resumed operations in a graded manner on September 7 In an interview to PTI in September 2020 Singh had said Restarting of services was not done on consideration of generating revenue or bringing ridership but to connect people and contribute to revival of the economy Again in 2021 amid the second wave of the pandemic which started in April services were again suspended for a long hiatus and were resumed from June 7 with limited capacity for seating passengers In the September 2020 interview he had also said that the COVID-19 situation had affected the Delhi Metros Phase-IV work but the ongoing project would get delayed only by a couple of months and the therefore wont entail much cost escalation The Union Cabinet in a meeting chaired by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in March 2019 had approved three out of the six corridors of the Delhi Metros proposed Phase-IV which will further improve connectivity in the national capital Under approved segment of Phase-IV 61679-km of new Metro lines will be constructed across three different corridors comprising 45 metro stations These new sections shall provide inter-connectivity among the already operational lines of the Delhi Metro According to the government the Mukundpur-Maujpur R K Ashram-Janakpuri West and Aero City-Tughlakabad corridors were approved by the Cabinet The DMRC networks current span is nearly 392 km with 286 stations including the Noida-Greater Noida Metro Corridor and Rapid Metro Gurgaon Singh has contributed greatly in the project implementation of Metros in Delhi and Kolkata and has been responsible for bringing revolutionary changes in the execution of large Metro engineering projects civil within tight deadlines and budget and is considered the foremost tunneling expert the DMRC had earlier said A Bijnor native he is a graduate in civil engineering from the University of Roorkee now IIT-Roorkee Thereafter he became part of the Indian Railways Services of Engineers IRSE in 1981 Singh joined the Indian Railways and worked in various capacities including as deputy chief engineer Kolkata Metro Railway 1989-1996 officials said In 1997 his journey began with the Delhi Metro Rail Corporation and he started in the capacity of a chief engineerchief project manager Later he rose to become executive director and then director works in the DMRC before taking the charge as its MD in 2012PTI KND VIT SMN SMN