Mohinder Verma
JAMMU, Oct 18: The 25-kilometer long Udhampur-Katra Railway Line has missed yet another deadline for commissioning due to delay in completion of track linking works and no new time-line has been fixed for opening of the line. Even the concerned officers of the Northern Railways are tightlipped over the reasons behind the stretching of work.
Sources privy to the progress of work on this railway line told EXCELSIOR that concerned construction division of the Northern Railways has failed to complete the work on different patches of Udhampur-Katra Section particularly the track linking till date and will take more time to make the entire line ready for chugging of trains.
Earlier the 25-kilometer line, which will connect the holy town of Katra, the base camp of Shri Mata Vaishnodevi Shrine in Reasi district, with rest of the country via train service, was scheduled to be completed latest by August end. However, the commissioning of the railway line was deferred till October due to non-availability of skilled manpower following July 18 incident at Gool, sources said.
The then Chief Administrative Officer of the Construction Division of Railways, Bhagwan Dass Garg, had on record told EXCELSIOR on July 30 that the commissioning of the railway line has been deferred till October and it will be opened for normal train traffic during Navratras. “Now, the October deadline has also been missed and no new time-frame has been fixed for the completion of railway line in all respects”, sources said.
In response to a question, sources said that though necessary papers have been submitted to the Commissioner of Railways Safety (CRS) by the Northern Railways yet the CRS inspection would not be possible until Northern Railways completes all sorts of works. “Even the GRP authorities of the State have no information about when the Udhampur-Katra section would be thrown open for train traffic. All what is known to everybody is that October deadline has also been missed”, sources added.
“Udhampur-Katra rail line is the only section in Jammu and Kashmir whose fate remains hanging in balance for quite long time. Earlier, this section jumped several deadlines ownig to various complications particularly seeping of water in two tunnels which prompted the authorities to carry out additional works”, they said.
The ballast-less track is being laid on the Udhampur-Katra section, which involved about 11 km of tunneling, nine major bridges, 29 minor bridges and 10 rail over-bridges/rail under-bridges. The tallest bridge in this section is 85m high (Bridge No. 20) and the longest tunnel is 3.15 km long.
When contacted, Chief Engineer of the Project, Sandeep Gupta said, “I am not authorized to speak to media. The exact picture about the project can be given only by the Chief PRO Northern Railways”. However, the Chief PRO, Neeraj said that he will have to collect the information and for that he needs at least one week.
The new Chief Administrative Officer of the Northern Railways Construction Division, Surinder Koul could not be contacted despite repeated attempts. It is not understandable as to why all the concerned are tightlipped over the reasons behind missing yet another deadline.
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