Indo-Japanese ties ride high on the bullet train

Prime Minister Narendra Modi along with his Japanese counterpart Shinzo Abe on Saturday travelled in Japan's famed high-speed Shinkansen bullet train on Saturday. The train is being introduced in India on the Mumbai-Ahmedabad stretch.

Modi and Abe travelled in the train, whose speed ranges from 240 kms per hour to 320 kms per hour, from Tokyo to Kobe, a city on Osaka Bay in Japan. "On the way to Kobe with PM @AbeShinzo. We are on board the Shinkansen bullet train," Prime Minister Modi tweeted along with pictures of him in deep conversation with Abe.

"A unique friendship on a unique train journey. PM @narendramodi and PM @AbeShinzo inside the Shinkansen bullet train to Kobe," External Affairs Ministry spokesperson Vikas Swarup tweeted. The construction of the high-speed train corridor between Mumbai and Ahmedabad will start in 2018 and the train service will be operational from 2023.

Abe, at a joint press conference with Prime Minister Modi here on Friday, had said that the designing of the project will begin by the end of this year. He said the ambitious project "symbolises a new dimension in the special relations" between the two countries and hoped that introduction of the rapid train network will spur further economic growth in India.

The high speed rail system 'Shinkansen' was introduced in Japan in 1964. Earlier when Modi arrived at the Tokyo Station to board the train Swarup said, "Putting #IndiaJapan relations on the fast track! PM @narendramodi and PM @AbeShinzo arrive at Tokyo Station to board the Shinkansen.