From Our Correspondent
Agartala: The ongoing railway extension work in Tripura looks set to be suffered due to severe shortage of funds during the current financial year (2013-14).
Sources said, the Railway budget had allocated only Rs. 140 crore for Agartala-Udaipur railway extension project.
The 44 km railway extension work was scheduled to be completed in December 2014.
At least Rs. 350 crore is required to meet the achievement target but this will not happened due to shortage of fund that the project had declared as national project.
“So far, only 45 percent work has been done in the project and it will take two more year to complete the work if adequate fund is available”, said an official involved in the railway extension project.
However, the state government and Northeast Frontier Railway (NFR) have been trying to receive more fund to maintain the normal pace of the work. But no tangible result is forthcoming yet.
“Now the main obstacle is fund crunch. If the fund is available, the 44 km railway extension work would be completed in the stipulated time as the problem centering land acquisition has already been sorted out”, he said.
The railway extension project from Udaipur to Sabroom has been undertaken by the construction agency.
“The land acquisition process is going on for the project. The agency will be fixed once the required land is provided to NFR”, said an official of Transport department here on Monday.
The 67-km rail extension work is scheduled to be completed by December 2015.
But the way work is going on, the NFR will not be able to commission the project within the stipulated time, according to sources.
The estimated cost of the total project- 107 km – from Agartala to Sabroom via Udaipur stands at 1141 crore.