Network Planning Group Recommends 3 New Railway Projects

The government on Thursday said the Network Planning Group constituted under the institutional framework of ‘PM GatiShakti National Master Plan’ has examined and recommended three important railway projects.

These projects are Doubling of Gorakhpur Cantt – Valmikinagar rail line, Katihar – Mukuria and Katihar – Kumedpur Doubling and Pachora – Jamner Gauge Conversion & Extension upto Bodwad.
All three projects are extremely important with a view to ensure faster movement of goods in the hinterland which will accelerate the logistics efficiency and bring a reduction in logistics costs.

MoR has identified a ‘high-density network’ of railway lines to achieve the target of 3000 million metric tonnes of freight movement. As part of that mission, three critically important projects have been identified as follows:

The main objective of Doubling of Gorakhpur Cantt – Valmikinagar rail line is to ensure freight flow, particularly food grain movement from western India to the North Eastern States, Gorakhpur Cantt – Valmikinagar (95 km.) is an important stretch which was having only a single railway line affecting the freight movement. From Valmikinagar upto Muzaffarpur, work on doubling is already going on. This proposed doubling project with a cost of Rs 1120 Crore is expected to improve logistics efficiency significantly.

Whereas, Katihar – Mukuria and Katihar – Kumedpur are extremely busy sections. Currently, this is a single line and it is a Rajdhani train route. This is an important link to connect Northeast and also Howrah. Doubling these sections will significantly help the movement of cargo from Kolkata Port to Virat Nagar. The cost of this project is Rs.942 Crore.

Pachora – Jamner Gauge Conversion and Extension upto Bodwad project is in the State of Maharashtra. Pachora to Jamner Gauge Conversion and extension of the railway line of Bodwad. This project would be 84 km. long at an anticipated cost of Rs.955 Crore. This project will provide bye-pass double line railway connectivity for Jalgaon and Bhusawal. It will provide faster freight movement from JNPT to Nagpur and the eastern region of the country.

It is notable that the Network Planning Group has recommended all 3 project proposals. The members of the Network Planning Group have further suggested certain components from integrated planning and synchronized implementation concepts. M/o Environment, Forests and Climate Change has assured faster clearances. All these projects have been mapped on PM GatiShakti NMP. Through PM GatiShakti NMP it shall be possible to implement these projects in the next five years within the estimated cost.

The Network Planning Group has the head of Planning Divisions of the infrastructure Ministries including M/o Railways, MoRTH, Power, MoPNG, MNRE, DoT, MoCA, and MoPSW with a special representative from NITI Aayog and MoEF&CC. Logistics Division, DPIIT functions as the secretariat of PM GatiShakti. (ANI)