The Railway Board has not yet cleared the proposal for taking up the construction of the infrastructure facilities for the proposed Railway Division in Kalaburagi at a cost of Rs. 90 crore submitted by the Rail Vikas Nigam Ltd (RVNL).
Solapur Divisional Railway Manager, John Thomas, told a District level vigilance and in-charge committee review meeting of the centrally assisted programmes chaired by former Railway Minister and Leader of Congress in the Lok Sabha, M. Mallikarjun Kharge in Kalaburagi on Wednesday, that once the railway board gives its green signal the construction work would begin.
The Jurisdiction of the proposed new railway division at Kalaburagi coming under the South Western Railways has also been finalised, Mr. Thomas said. Mr. Kharge who sought the details of various railway works taken up in Kalaburagi said that the proposal was mooted by the then Railway Board member and the new Chairman of the Railway Board, A.B. Mittal and hoped that he would clear the proposal at the earliest.
He said that he had already spoken to Mr. Mittal after he took over the charge as the new chairman and raised the issue of ongoing railway projects and pending railway projects in Karnataka in general and Kalaburagi in particular. “Mr Mittal has assured that he would look into all these issues”.
The Railway Department officials said that the State government should release Rs. 132 Crore due to the railways as share of the State government for the Kalaburagi-Bidar Railway line project to speed up the work. Railways, out of its share of Rs. 422 crore has already spent Rs. 404 crore. Of the State’s share so far, only Rs. 290 crore has been released.
The Bidar-Kalaburagi Railway line is expected to be completed by December 2016. They also said that the work on the proposed Railway Over Bridges in Kalaburagi would be executed as scheduled and the pit-lines in Kalaburagi and Bidar railway stations would also completed as scheduled.
The Railway officials present in the meeting said that the tenders for the construction of the Railway Bogie Construction factory at Kadechur in the outskirts of Yadgir would be opened on January 12 and after finalising the tenders, the work orders would be issued within two months. The construction of the coach factory would be completed by December 2016. The estimated cost of the factory was Rs. 90.91 crore and the tender for Rs. 69 crores has been floated now.
Deputy Commissioner, Vipul Bansal said that 6-acre additional land sought by the railways for doubling work at Gangapur railway station would be given to the railways at the earliest and also meet the sand requirements of the railway projects without any delay. The KUWSDB Executive Engineer Ashok B Madyal agreed to provide 2 lakh litres of water every day to Kalaburagi Railway Station to meet the demand at the two pit-lines as and when the railways gave the proposal.
