President of the Udupi Railway Yatri Sangha R.L. Dias said on Saturday that people of Udupi-Chikmagalur parliamentary constituency should boycott the by-election if the Ministry of Railways did not extend the service of train no. 16517 to Karwar.
Mr. Dias told presspersons here that this train was running from Bangalore (Yeshwanthapur) to Kannur through Mangalore. The train should be extended to Karwar after detaching 10 of the 17 bogies in Mangalore. The remaining seven bogies could go from Mangalore to Kannur.
The sangha had submitted this proposal to South Western Railway, which had forwarded it to the Railway Board a year ago. The fate of this proposal would become clear in the railway budget to be presented on March 14. If the proposal was not included in the budget, people should boycott the by-election on March 18. They could vote for the candidate who would get this work done, he said.
The sangha was planning to stage a rail roko at the Udupi Railway Station on March 19 or 20, Mr. Dias said.
