Delhi: Work on Pink Line picks up pace

New Delhi: After mired in several delays due to land acquisition, a portion of the Delhi Metro’s longest corridor — Majlis Park to Shiv Vihar — will be completed by September. Delhi Metro authorities said that the stretch from Majlis Park to Lajpat Nagar will be completed by September this year. The stretch will improve connectivity between the northwestern parts of the city and South Delhi.

The 59-km corridor has been battling land acquisition woes at several places, especially at Trilokpuri. It had already missed its December 2016 deadline. The highlight of the corridor (Pink Line) is that it will run along the busy Ring Road between Majlis Park and Lajpat Nagar.

Being the longest corridor in Delhi Metro’s history, the construction of the corridor has been challenging for the authorities, most importantly the issue of availability of the land pockets. At Trilokpuri, the construction of the corridor has been stuck for over a year now and the land issue is yet to be resolved. At areas such as Punjabi Bagh and Hari Nagar, the construction had to be stopped due to jhuggis coming in its way. By the time land was made available at these areas after seeking intervention from the government, severe delays had already been caused.

According to the authorities, 95 per cent of the work has been completed on the Majlis Park-Lajpat Nagar stretch and efforts will be made to commission the portion by the year-end. Metro officials said that the Lajpat Nagar-Mayur Vihar stretch of the Pink Line will take time and the authorities have fixed December as the target deadline for its commencement.

The stretch between IP Extension and Shiv Vihar will take a longer time to be finished due to the presence of houses at Trilokpuri, which have to be relocated. Seeing this, the authorities have fixed April 2018 as the deadline for this portion of the corridor.

The Pink Line is the most significant corridor of the Metro network as it has been laid like a ring touching all parts of Delhi and it will drastically cut travel time between eastern and southern flanks of the national capital. It will have a total of 38 Metro stations, out of which 26 will be elevated and 12 will be underground. With eight interchange stations, the line alone is going to take the maximum load of the 40 lakh people per day Metro ridership which is expected after the opening of Phase III.

This line will connect Northwest Delhi’s Mukundpur to Northeast Delhi’s Shiv Vihar, cutting across various South Delhi areas including Sarojini Nagar, INA, South Extension, and the densely populated parts of East Delhi such as Mayur Vihar Phase I, Vinodnagar, and Karkardooma.