A concerted endeavour is being taken up by a group of employees of the South Central Railway to showcase the plight of rail infrastructure and the snail’s pace of ongoing projects in the geography of the newly carved out Telangana State.
The broad objective is to get the Railway Board to prioritise projects that were closer to completion and sanction more funds to expedite them so that they would start generating income.
The endeavour stems out of the belief that injustice was done to the new State comprising 10 districts including Hyderabad despite the fact that Telangana had less number of route km and Railway employees generated more income than those in AP.
Work on projects, they regretted, was either going at a snail’s pace or there was no progress at all. Nine surveys were sanctioned in 2012-13 but they are yet to take off.
Seeking increased allocation for projects apart, the immediate demands of the employees include renaming of the AP Express as Telangana Express and a new Telangana Sampark Kranthi Express to New Delhi, more passenger trains from Secunderabad to Sirpur Kagaznagar, Mahabubnagar, Nizamabad, Miryalguda and Tandur and appointing an officer hailing from Telangana as Managing Director of Hyderabad Metro Rail.
When contacted, a senior SCR officer said the Railway Budget to be presented in Parliament later this month would have the announcement of the AP Express being renamed as Telangana Express. Asked about a new Telangana Sampark Kranthi Express to New Delhi, he dismissed it as not feasible, .In medium and long-term, the employees wanted works on the newly-sanctioned wagon factory at Kazipet to be speeded up and a new Coach Factory. They also want all trains running towards Mumbai from Hyderabad/Secunderabad to be run from Kazipet to help Telangana migrants in Sholapur, Pune, Mumbai, Bhiwandi and Surat.
