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As Delhi-Meerut RRTS wraps up, NCRTC sees Rs 700-crore dip in Union Budget. Here’s why

In the Union Budget presented on Sunday by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, Rs 1,324 crore were allocated under revenue expenditure and Rs 876 crore for capital expenditure on the project.

3 min readNew DelhiUpdated: Feb 2, 2026 12:28 PM IST

delhi budget, Budget, budget allocation, Union Budget 2026, Nirmala Sitharaman, budget allocation, Rekha Gupta, delhi news, India news, Indian express, current affairs

Union Minister for Finance Nirmala Sitharaman poses with her team for a photo op before leaving to present the Budget in New Delhi on Sunday. (Express Photo by Tashi Tobgyal)

With work on the entire Delhi-Meerut Namo Bharat Regional Rapid Transit System (RRTS) corridor nearly complete, the budgetary allocation to the National Capital Region Transport Corporation (NCRTC), the nodal agency for implementing the multi-modal transport system for the NCR, has been reduced by around 25% — from Rs 2,918 crore in 2025-26 to Rs 2,200 crore.

In the Union Budget presented on Sunday by Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman, Rs 1,324 crore were allocated under revenue expenditure and Rs 876 crore for capital expenditure on the project.

“These allocations would give the push for work to start on new corridors as and when they get sanctioned,” an official from NCRTC said.

Notably, the latest allocation is more than the amount the agency was able to spend this fiscal — Rs 2,000 crore — with just two months remaining. Nearly all of the unspent funds were under the capital head — of the Rs 2,471 crore sanctioned, the agency only spent Rs 1,528 crore.

The agency is currently waiting for the Centre to clear remaining two corridors of Phase I of the RRTS project — Delhi to Karnal in Haryana and a part of the Delhi to Alwar corridor. Both are said to be at the advanced stages of consideration by the Centre.This is the country’s first RRTS.

At present, a 55-km section of the 82-km Delhi-Meerut corridor, from New Ashok Nagar in Delhi to Meerut South in Uttar Pradesh, is operational. The complete corridor has undergone successful trial runs and is expected to become fully operational soon, officials said.

All three corridors have been planned to converge at the Sarai Kale Khan Namo Bharat station in the Capital. Once sanctioned, the remaining two projects will take at least five to six years for completion.

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The recently released 2025-26 Economic Survey of India lauded the RRTS project for its contribution to pollution mitigation and labour market benefits. “Since partial operations began, an estimated 25 lakh vehicle trips have been avoided, offsetting around 69 lakh kg of CO2, with a roadmap to source 60% of energy from renewables,” it underlined.

The survey highlighted that the construction of the project alone generated roughly 166 lakh mandays between 2019 and 2025, while operations are expected to support around 12 lakh mandays annually. Early accessibility estimates suggest large gains in jobs reachable within one hour-nearly 6.9-7.6 lakh for Meerut and about one lakh for Sarai Kale Khan.

It also pointed out that the identification of nearly 2,900 km of potential Namo Bharat RRTS corridors across regional clusters such as Bengaluru–Mysuru–Tumakuru–Hosur, Chennai–Vellore–Villupuram–Chengalpattu and Hyderabad–Warangal, among others, could help the regions as engines of growth.

Devansh Mittal

Devansh Mittal is a Correspondent at The Indian Express, based in the New Delhi City bureau. He reports on urban policy, civic governance, and infrastructure in the National Capital Region, with a growing focus on housing, land policy, transport, and the disruption economy and its social implications. Professional Background Education: He studied Political Science at Ashoka University. Core Beats: His reporting focuses on policy and governance in the National Capital Region, one of the largest urban agglomerations in the world. He covers housing and land policy, municipal governance, urban transport, and the interface between infrastructure, regulation, and everyday life in the city. Recent Notable Work His recent reporting includes in-depth examinations of urban policy and its on-ground consequences: An investigation into subvention-linked home loans that documented how homebuyers were drawn into under-construction projects through a “builder–bank” nexus, often leaving them financially exposed when delivery stalled. A detailed report on why Delhi’s land-pooling policy has remained stalled since 2007, tracing how fragmented land ownership, policy design flaws, and mistrust among stakeholders have kept one of the capital’s flagship urban reforms in limbo. A reported piece examining the collapse of an electric mobility startup and what it meant for women drivers dependent on the platform for livelihoods. Reporting Approach Devansh’s work combines on-ground reporting with analysis of government data, court records, and academic research. He regularly reports from neighbourhoods, government offices, and courtrooms to explain how decisions on housing, transport, and the disruption economy shape everyday life in the city. Contact X (Twitter): @devanshmittal_ Email: devansh.mittal@expressindia.com ... Read More

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