Thane: Railway Ministry has found most of
the projects in Maharashtra either uneconomical or unviable,
according to an RTI reply.
According to the reply sought by local activist Om
Prakash Varma, the long-pending Pune-Nashik rail network has
been shelved and some other projects have been taken up on
cost sharing basis by the Centre.
Except for Nagpur, Wardha and Wardha-Ballarshah 3rd
Line, most of the projects were found to be financially
unviable.
The reply also states that the sanction of the railway
line was done on the basis of National Transport Policy,
besides criteria like strategic consideration, existence of
mineral and natural resources, likely availability of traffic
in future due to coming up of industries/power plants,
development of alternative route to name a few.
The work on extension of 54.163 kms Baramati-Lonand
line (between Daund-Baramati ) which was shelved in 1994 has
been finally sanctioned in 1997.
The Nashik-Kopagraon line of 92.60 kms was also
shelved in 1996 and new BG line between Shirdi and Kopargaon
and Puntamba was later sanctioned.
The Wardha-Pusad-Nanded line was sanctioned on cost
sharing basis again with the state government, the reply
stated.
The updating of RECT survey work between Jalna and
Khamgaon was finally sanctioned in 2010-11.
The 350 kms Manmad-Dhule line is still hanging fire
with the survey report submitted to the Board way back in 2008
and 2009 still collecting dust and no decision has come
through.
The 265.90 kms Pune-Nashik line survey report was
submitted to the government and the project was shelved in
2001 and again a report was submitted in 2010 and finally the
project has been buried and shelved by the Board in June 2010.
The Dhule-Amalner railway line report has been
submitted to the board in March 2011.
The Wardha-Katol line the survey work has been
sanctioned in 2010-11 after being shelved by the Board in
1978. The RECT survey of Khandwa-Nardana line has been
shelved by the board in 2004 itself.
PTI
