Union Railway Minister, Suresh Prabhakar Prabhu on Tuesday announced that a new railway terminal equipped with world-class facilities would be established in Gurugram to reduce the mounting pressure on the Delhi terminal due to the increase in number of trains coming to the national capital from different parts of the country.
“The work on this project would soon be started. Besides, the Rohtak railway station would be developed as a model station in public-private-partnership (PPP) mode,” said the Union Minister while speaking at function organised by Northern Railways at Rohtak.
The Union Minister, in the presence of Haryana Chief Minister Manohar lal, dedicated newly-electrified rail section between Rohtak and Jind to the nation. He also flagged off new DEMU train between Jind and Sonipat through video conference, for the convenience of rail passengers by providing intercity connectivity.
Extending greetings to the people on the occasion of Ram Navami, Prabhu said that tender for new Rohtak-Meham-Hansi railway line would be finalised in August this year.
This work would be completed by the end of December, 2019. Apart from this, the proposed Rail Coach Factory in district Sonipat would be developed on PPP mode. The work on this project would be started at the earliest, said the Union Minister.
He said that so far, electrification work has been completed on about 42 per cent of the total rail network in the state. This figure would be doubled in the next five years as a plan has already been started in this direction, said he.
Prabhu said that Railways would save Rs 41,000 crore in coming 10 years by installing solar power plants, wind power plant and lED lights. With a view to promote greenery, five crore saplings are also being planted by the railways, he added.
He said that the Indian Railways would continue its efforts to extend greater connectivity in the atate. Investment in railways in the country has been increased to Rs 3.5 lakh crore during the last two-and-a-half years.
The present Union Government has increased the annual share of Haryana in Rail Budget to Rs 1,247 crore for 2017-18, whereas this share was Rs 314 crore from 2009 to 2014. Survey work on 55-km Yamunanagar-Jagadhari-Kurukshetra-ladwa link and 65 km on Kaithal-Patiala link has been approved in 2017-18, said he.
Speaking on the occasion, Chief Minister Manohar lal thanked the Union Railways Minister for dedicating the new rail projects to the people. He said that work on Elevated Railway line on the Rohtak-Gohana stretch had already been started which would help in decongesting Rohtak city. This is the first-ever elevated rail track of Indian Railways being built for facilitating smoother road traffic in densely-populated city areas. The work on this project would soon be completed, said Manohar lal.
The Chief Minister said that provision of Rs 100 crore had been made in current year budget estimates for joint venture projects to be undertaken with Railways. The Government had also decided to construct Railway Over Bridges (RoBs) and Railway Under Bridges (RuBs) on all unmanned level crossings in the state. As many as 24 RuBs and RoBs have already been constructed by the present government and 21 are under construction, he added.