In the wake of the recent bus accident at Avinashi in Tiruppur district of Tamil Nadu that led to the death of 19 persons, the State government is once again pushing for the proposed Thalassery-Mysuru rail project under the consideration of Kerala Rail Development Corporation Limited (KRDCL).
The project, an official source said, had been in cold storage for nearly seven months after the Ministry of Railways last year directed not to go ahead with the survey for the project until it received an approval from Karnataka government.
But, after the accident, the State government appeared keen to go ahead with the project. “People from the State, especially from north Kerala, are relying on bus routes only because of the lack of train services,” he said.
The only rail connectivity to Bengaluru side is through the Palakkad-Salem route which is time-consuming and saturated with traffic. “Any rail connectivity from Bengaluru to north Kerala via Mysuru could save travel time of commuters to Kerala and back. This will drastically reduce vehicular pollution caused road traffic. Moreover, the widening of roads in Ghats section is almost impossible due to landslips and wildlife habitat issues in these sectors,” said O. Jayarajan, former Deputy Conservator of Forests who served as environmental consultant for alignment of the Thalassery-Mysuru rail line.
KRDCL, a joint venture company under the Kerala government and the Ministry of Railways, had taken up the three-year-old rail line project connecting Thalassery to Mysuru via Mananthavadi in Wayanad district and Kannur district.
The proposed rail line connects Thalassery, Panoor, Vilangad, Niravilpuzha, Tharuvana, Kalpetta, Meenangady and Pulaplly in Kerala and HD Kotte, Kadakole and Mysuru in Karnataka.
Lengthy tunnel
However, the present proposal includes a lengthy tunnel across the Kabani river, saving the wildlife tracts of Wayanad Wildlife Sanctuary, Bandipur Tiger Reserve and the Nagerhole National Park. Unfortunately, the project proposal had been kept in abeyance for the last seven months for want of permission for survey from the Karnataka government, he said.
Mr. Jayarajan said thousands of vehicles were plying daily between Bengaluru and north and south Kerala, cutting across the Western Ghats at various points such as Sullia, Mananthavady, Bandipur and Nadukani.
