From Our Correspondent
Agartala: Though the Bangladesh government has been making progress in the Agartala-Akhaura rail project, it’s Indian counterpart- the Ministry of Railways authority has been doing little to materialise the long cherished dream.
While the Bangladesh government has already started land acquisition process in its territory as per the decision taken in the Indo-Bangla joint steering committee held in Dhaka, the Railways Ministry has made no headway in land acquisition process yet.
Nur Mohammad Majumder, Deputy Commissioner and Collector of Brahmanbaria (Bangladesh) who was here to attend Indo-Bangla joint border committee meeting told reporters the Bangladesh government wants to finish the project at the earliest. “Tender for laying rail track is expected to be floated within this year as the land acquisition process has already got underway”, he said.
The state government had requested the Railways Ministry to take up land acquisition process for the proposed five km rail link (Indian side) in January last, said Kishore Ambuly, the Secretary of Transport department here on Friday.
The IRCON which is supposed to take up the task, has not taken up the matter yet sparking off confusion over the speedy completion of the dream rail project.
“Unfortunately, we have not received any communiqué from the Centre even as second meeting of Indo-Bangla joint steering committee is scheduled to be held here in September”, Ambuly said while talking to reporters at Civil Secretariat. Overall progress in the 15 km rail link is scheduled to be reviewed in the second meeting of Indo-Bangla joint committee.
As per the assurance, the Railways Ministry is supposed to bear the expenditure of land acquisition meant for the Indo-Bangla rail link.
The Indo-Bangla joint team had already finalised the alignment for the proposed rail link. An amount of Rs. 341 crore is expected to be needed to lay rail-track in between Agartala and Akhaura (Bangladesh).
Chief Minister Manik Sarkar has personally talked to President Pranab Mukherjee when he visited the state recently to push the Indo-Bangla rail link.
