Budget 2026: Minister MB Patil among people asking for more, responding to FM's high-speed corridor announcement

India Budget 2026: Chennai and Hyderabad are among the cities the high-speed rail corridors (HSR) would connect, but the budget proposal has left people, including a minister, asking for more. The announcement sparked some excitement as well as demands.

Karnataka’s industries & infrastructure minister MB Patil, while welcoming the move, said the project, in the way it’s proposed, offered limited benefit to his state.

“Instead, a similar corridor should have been taken up between Bengaluru and Pune. MPs from Karnataka and Maharashtra must raise this issue collectively and in a non-partisan manner, the minister said in a statement. On both corridors announced by finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman in her budget, barely 100 km fell within Karnataka, he added.


Sections of citizens pointed out that the southern states do not have enough fast trains. “Disappointing Tamil Nadu high-speed rail (HSR) network planned Chennai as a terminating destination benefiting only the city at northern tip of state. Eight Crore TN population will really benefit only if HSR alignment covers Coimbatore and Madurai to Chennai and extends to Bengaluru and Hyderabad," civil engineer Dayanand Krishnan wrote on X.

Other users echoed similar concerns, pointing out that Hyderabad appears to be the primary beneficiary in south India, while Tamil Nadu and Karnataka, barring their capital regions, have been largely ignored. Kerala has been left out entirely. Critics also questioned why there is no high-speed rail from Bengaluru to Mumbai covering coastal and Malnad areas like Mangalore, Udupi, Uttara Kannada, and Shimoga, which they say have been consistently neglected.

Meanwhile, Darjeeling MP Raju Bista (BJP) welcomed the proposal, saying the Siliguri-Varanasi-Delhi corridor will dramatically improve passenger mobility and integrate North Bengal with national growth centres.

The proposed HSR corridors include Mumbai-Pune, Pune-Hyderabad, Hyderabad-Bengaluru, Hyderabad-Chennai, Chennai-Bengaluru, Delhi-Varanasi, and Varanasi-Siliguri. These routes span western, southern, and eastern India, linking major metros, tech hubs, and manufacturing clusters.

The announcement builds on India's first high-speed rail project, the Mumbai-Ahmedabad corridor, which began construction in 2021 and has completed close to 500 kilometres as of 2026, with operations expected to begin in 2029. The total capital expenditure under the Ministry of Railways is set to rise from Rs 2.5 lakh crore in FY26 to Rs 2.7 lakh crore in FY27.