A total of 3,331 hectares of vacant land is available under jurisdiction of Bilaspur-headquartered South East Central Railway (SECR), the Central Government has informed.
Meanwhile, nationally, as on March 31, 2016, out of 473052 hectares of land available with Indian Railways, approximately 52401 hectares of land is vacant.
As on March 31, 2016 , approximately 879.51 hectares of land (0.18%) is also under encroachment illegally by various segments of society which also include unscrupulous elements. For these encroachments, Railways carry out regular surveys and take action for their removal, it informed.
If the encroachments are of a temporary nature (soft encroachment) in the shape of slums and squatters, the same got removed in consultation and with the assistance of Railway Protection Force and local civil authorities. For old encroachments, where party is not amenable to persuasion, action is taken under Public Premises (Eviction of Unauthorized Occupants) Act, 1971 (PPE Act, 1971), as amended from time to time.
Actual eviction of unauthorized occupants is carried out with the assistance of State Government and police. Removal of encroachment is a continuous process, as a result of which, in last three years and current year (up to June, 2016), 94.28 hectares of encroached land has been retrieved. Railways have also taken measures to protect railway land from encroachment which include licensing of land to railway employees for Grow More Food (GMF) Scheme, provision of boundary wall, fencing and tree plantations at vulnerable locations. Notably, the Union Ministry of Railways will also develop eight stations in Chhattisgarh as ‘Model Stations’.
They are-- Bilaspur, Durg, Raipur, Raigarh, Champa, Bhatapara, Tilda and Rajnandgaon, officials stated.
Overall in South East Central Railway (SECR) division –Bilaspur, Durg, Raipur, Raigarh, Gondia, Champa, Shahdol, Bhatapara, Tilda, Rajnandgaon and Chhindwara have been chosen to be developed as 'Model Stations'. The ‘Model Station’ scheme was in vogue between June 1999 and November, 2008. A total of 594 stations were identified for development under Model Station Scheme.
Indian Railways have planned to offer ‘A-1’ and ‘A” category stations (about 400 in number) for redevelopment on ‘as is where is basis’ by inviting open bids from interested parties. Station re-development projects require close coordination with the State Government/local bodies in order to get necessary clearances such as mutation of land, change of land use, heritage clearance (if required), NOCs from local bodies etc.
Union Minister of Railways Suresh Prabhu has written letters to Chief Ministers of all States while requesting them to nominate coordinating officer in their respective States to facilitate these clearances.
Notably, as many as five ongoing projects under SECR had been put in the priority list by Union Railway Ministry for fast tracking implementation of the projects. Prioritization of projects is a continuous exercise carried out on the basis of traffic and safety considerations and availability of funds, officials stated.
In addition to ongoing projects, 77 doubling / tripling / quadrupling projects having an aggregate length of 9,040 Km and total estimated cost of Rs 90,304 crore were included in the Railway Budget for 2015-16 to decongest existing saturated section and create additional carrying capacity.