Congress Leader in the Lok Sabha M. Mallikarjun Kharge has expressed discontentment over slow progress of railway works in the Hyderabad-Karnataka region. Addressing a media conference at Aiwan-E-Shahi guest house in Kalaburagi on Monday, he appealed to the Railway Ministry to continue the initiatives that he had taken during his brief tenure as Railway Minister and speed up the works.
“In order to develop railway infrastructure in Hyderabad-Karnataka region, I had taken many initiatives such as opening a railway divisional office in Kalaburagi, track laying between Bidar and Kalaburagi stretch and Wadi and Gadag stretch, electrification of railway tracks, and construction of railway over-bridges at several level-crossings. While a few are yet to take off despite having budgetary allocations, rest are moving at a snail’s pace.”
Mr. Kharge said the issue of scarcity of sand that had delayed tunnel work in the Kalaburagi-Bidar railway stretch had been resolved. The Kalaburagi Regional Commissioner and Raichur Deputy Commissioner would facilitate quality sand extraction from Raichur district. “I hope the work would be completed by September this year.”
Pointing at the statutory issues involved in procurement of gravel required for track-doubling works, Mr. Kharge said that he had talked to others concerned for facilitating hassle-free procurement. “As per the new rules in force, permission is required for gravel mining. Upon my direction, the Regional Commissioner has asked the contractor to collect gravel from government lands and then go to private ones, if sufficient quantity is not available in the former source.”
Link road
Mr. Kharge said that a sum of Rs. 300 crore of the sanctioned Rs. 1,100 crore was released by the Union government for the construction of proposed link road around Kalaburagi city connecting two National Highways - 150E and 150A. The proposed link road practically forms the outer ring road after the stretch between Afzalpur Road (NH-150E) and Jewargi Road (NH-150A), which is not included in the project, is constructed. “We have obtained green signal to prepare a detailed project report for the left-over stretch between Afzalpur Road and Jewargi Road. Once both the projects are completed, Kalaburagi city would get another ring road.”
‘Grand alliance’
Mr. Kharge said that his party high command had initiated the process for forging a grand alliance (Mahaghatbandhan) with non-BJP parties at the national level ahead of the Presidential election. “The alliance would field a common candidate acceptable to all member parties. Those who are opposed to BJP’s divisive ideology too can vote for the alliance candidate for protecting secular socialism,” he said.
Former Minister Qamar-ul-Islam, Karnataka State Border Development Authority chairman Baburao Chinchansur and Kalaburagi Urban Development Authority Chairman Asagar Chulbul were present.
