Excelsior Correspondent
NEW DELHI, Jan 5 : The proposed Chattergala tunnel will connect district Kathua with district Doda enroute the new Highway via Basohli-Bani through Chattergala to touch Bhaderwah and Doda. This is going to be a historic landmark project providing all-weather alternate road connectivity between the two distant regions and reducing the travel time from Doda to Lakhanpur to just around four hours.
This was stated here today by Union Minister Dr. Jitendra Singh after he was briefed by the new Director General, Border Road Organisation (BRO), Lt General Rajeev Chaudhry about the ongoing and proposed road and bridge projects in Jammu & Kashmir and North East. In his presentation, Gen Choudhary said that Jammu & Kashmir and particularly Udhampur-Kathua-Doda Lok Sabha constituency had witnessed unprecedented progress in road and bridge construction in the last 5 to 6 years and about a dozen BRO bridges have come up in this single Lok Sabha constituency itself, the notable among which are Atal Setu at Basohli and Devika Bridge at Udhampur.
As for the Chattergala Project, the Minister was informed that it was going to be a 6.8 Km long tunnel for which the Feasibility Survey has already been conducted by BRO. The tunnel is likely to take about 4 years for completion after the execution work starts and its construction cost is around Rs. 3,000 crore.
Impressing upon the BRO Chief to expedite the process as fast as possible, Dr. Jitendra Singh said, Chattergala is going to be a revolutionary game changer, particularly for the districts Kathua and Doda. He said, this will not only generate revenue but also job generation. Moreover, the all-weather road connectivity will bring ease of business, shorten the travel time and also provide a unique opportunity for places like Bani and Bhaderwah to emerge as tourist destinations of national repute, he added.
Dr. Jitendra Singh said, the demand for the tunnel at Chattergalla had been pending for several years, but somehow not taken up by earlier governments because of their different priorities.
The other important BRO projects that came up during the review meeting included construction of road from Bhagwa to Lal-Darman to Masal-Dushnan in district Doda, Chkramore-Maharajpur-Rajbagh-Haria Chak road in district Kathua and upgradation of Phatala to Jakhani road in district Udhampur. Gen Choudhary also gave Dr. Jitendra Singh a brief about a dozen BRO road and bridge projects coming in his Lok Sabha constituency.
About the Northeast, Dr. Jitendra Singh received an update, particularly about road projects funded by the North Eastern Council (NEC) under the aegis of the Ministry of Development of North Eastern Region (DoNER) in Mizoram and two other BRO projects in Manipur.
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