‘No railway route in Bengal will be closed’

Kolkata: Eastern Railway general manager Harindra Rao on Wednesday gave details of the budgetary allocations of Rs 2.662.66 crores in wake of the reports of reduction in the figure of fund allocations for West Bengal in the Union Budget. He informed that no railway route in the state will be closed.

“There is no closure of any rail route in West Bengal,” he said. According to Mr Rao, the Budget focussed on the passenger amenitites, infrastructure and safety issues of the railways. At a press meet at Fairlie Place, the ER headquarters Mr Rao said, “For passenger ameninities a new work which has been exclusively sanctioned for the ER is around Rs 579.49 crores.”

Out of the amount Rs 300 crores alone has been earmarked for FOB and raising of platforms. Mr Rao elaborated that giving priority to safety, Rs 52.74 crores have been allotted for the level crossings while Rs 781.16 crores, the biggest amount in the tally of the categories, have been allotted for the track renewal for 40 works.

He also underlined that for the railway electrification works Rs 304.52 crores have been allotted for the Rampurhat-Dumka, Bhagalpur-Dumka including Bhagalpur-Baka, Jassidih-Dumka including Deoghar-Baka, Madhupur-Giridih (361 km) while 53.66 crores have been sanctioned for Katwa-Ahmedpur route of 52 km.

Besides Rs 178.33 crores have been earmarked for the bridge works with Rs 152.54 crores being sanctioned for the signallling & telecommunications.