Karnataka

Electrification of rail network will get priority, says Minister Velu

CHAMARAJANAGAR: Minister of State for Railways R. Velu said here on Tuesday that electrification of the existing rail network would receive priority in addition to expansion to provide connectivity to remote regions of the country.

Addressing a press conference here after inaugurating the Nanjangud–Chamarajanagar broadgauge line, the Minister said electrification is being taken up for various reasons, including efficiency and cost of operations in view of the rise in the cost of diesel.

“Not much importance was accorded to railway electrification in the previous Five Year plans but we will focus on it in the future,” said the Minister.

To a question on the proposed high speed passenger corridor between different cities, Mr. Velu said only pre-feasibility studies will be conducted initially.

There was a proposal to introduce high speed passenger service on select routes which yielded high returns, including Bangalore and Chennai, with state-of-the-art signalling and control systems. It was also envisaged to have sections with dedicated tracks to facilitate trains to run at a speed of over 300 kmph. The proposed corridor included Delhi–Chandigarh–Amritsar, Pune–Mumbai–Ahmedabad, Hyderabad–Dornakal–Vijayawada–Chennai and Chennai–Bangalore–Coimbatore–Ernakulam sections.

But the Minister said pre-feasibility studies will be followed by a feasibility study as such high speed service was not feasible at this stage of development and it was not a priority for the railways while extending coverage to remote regions. However, upgrading the existing tracks would receive priority, he said. He said that the proposal for a dedicated freight corridor was on and a special purpose vehicle had been constituted to expedite the project.

Earlier, Mr. Velu said the Indian Railways had performed well and earned in excess of Rs. 25,000 crore during the last four years. He was confident of repeating the performance during this fiscal despite the slowdown in growth.

“The Indian Railways would have given the Union Government Rs. 1,00,000 crore as revenue in the course of five years,” Mr. Velu added.

The Minister said there was growing emphasis on providing better passenger amenities and services and there had been a four-fold increase in the budgetary allocation for it. “We increased the budgetary allocation from Rs. 222 crore in the last budget to Rs. 824 crore for this fiscal,” he said.

On the track doubling work between Ramanagaram and Mysore, he said there was a technical problem at Srirangapatna where the track alignment had a 9 degree curve and it was impossible to run trains on double line track. So the State Government should request the Archaeology Department to release some space, he said referring to the armoury of Tipu Sultan’s period. “Otherwise, the project may get delayed,” he added.

Mr. Velu also referred to various projects in the State that faced problems with regard to land acquisition. He urged the State Government to expedite the process and cited the example of Hubli-Ankola line which is pending since many years.

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