Sanjeev Pargal
JAMMU, July 12: Railways Minister Suresh Prabhu has agreed to order survey on railway lines between Udhampur and Kishtwar, Jammu to Poonch and Baramulla to Kupwara shortly and set up a railways manufacturing factory in Jammu to generate employment opportunities and increase presence of railways in the State.
This was announced by Prabhu during his five days long visit, which will conclude tomorrow, in meeting with the Railways officials, political leadership and others. However, Prabhu’s visit to holy cave shrine of Mata Vaishno Devi ji and Jammu Railway Station, which was scheduled for today, was cancelled due to adverse weather conditions. He will now fly back to New Delhi directly from Srinagar tomorrow morning.
Official sources told the Excelsior that Suresh Prabhu has agreed to order immediate survey on railway line from Udhampur to Kishtwar via Bhaderwah and Doda, Jammu to Poonch via Akhnoor and Rajouri and Baramulla to Kupwara.
“The survey on three railway lines in Jammu and Kashmir will be ordered at the earliest and depending upon feasibility report of the survey, work would be taken up on the railway lines,’’ sources said, adding that though initially the Centre had proposed Udhampur-Bhaderwah-Doda-Kishtwar line, the Railways will also explore possibility of rail link to Bhaderwah from Kathua via Bani, Basohli and Sarthal.
While train was already chugging between Banihal to Baramulla, the Railways have agreed to conduct survey on Baramulla-Kupwara rail line to extend the service up to the border district of Kashmir.
“All three surveys will be taken up simultaneously,’’ sources said, adding that the Railways would appoint separate teams for the surveys. Only those rail lines, which were found feasible during the surveys, would be taken up for execution.
Jammu-Poonch rail line was initially taken up as national project in 2011 but the UPA Government had shelved it in 2013 on the ground that the line was not found feasible. In 2015 railways budget, Suresh Prabhu revived the project and ordered fresh survey on the line from Jammu to Poonch via Akhnoor-Kaleeth, Doori Dagger, Chowki Chowra-Bhambla-Nowshera and Rajouri.
Similarly survey on railway line up to Bhaderwah and Kishtwar to link Chenab Valley with rest of the country will be taken up from two sides i.e. Udhampur and Kathua and whichever side was found feasible would be considered for laying the railway line.
The Railways also proposed to extend the rail line from Banihal to Baramulla up to Kupwara but the work would be taken up after feasibility report from the survey.
Sources said the Railways have also agreed to the demand to explore possibility for setting up a railways factory in Jammu to generate employment opportunities.
Meanwhile, Suresh Prabhu today inspected railway track between Srinagar to Banihal. He boarded the DMU at Srinagar’s Nowgam railway station and travelled up to Banihal. He returned in the train up to Anantnag and then travelled to Pahalgam by road. In the evening, he returned to Srinagar, where he would have night halt before flying back to New Delhi tomorrow morning.
During his visit, Prabhu had flagged off four new services in Srinagar and also visited holy cave shrine of Shri Amarnath ji. He was scheduled to visit Vaishno Devi ji shrine today in Jammu but was unable to fly due to bad weather conditions. He had to return to New Delhi in Jhelum Express tonight but would now fly to New Delhi by air.
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