ProUI

rain schedules to be affected; long-distance trains to get priority

The Southen Railways is on the threshold of completing the project to provide double tracks between Shoranur and Mangalore, which will, once completed, enable railways to run more trains at greater speed. At present about 50 trains move in both directions on this 307-km section.

The final stage of the work, which will be done mostly manually and would require disconnection of power lines, will involve major signalling and engineering work. This will ensure the new line between Karakkad and Shoranur are linked and made to work effectively along with existing single track.

The Railways have planned to undertake the work between September 25 and October 16.

Under the project, there will be an additional platform line (Platform No.7) to hold 26 coaches at Shoranur while the length of the Platform 2 and 4 would be increased by 30 to 50 m so that long trains can be handled, a release said. A new lay-bye line to hold three engines would help the railways avoid delay in change of engines of express or passenger trains, the release added.

The Pre-Stressed Concrete sleepers will replace the wooden sleeper points for better safety of the running trains. During the final phase of work, signals and the interlocking system which ensures safety of trains will be not be available. As a result trains will move slower across Shoranur.

Train movement will be stopped for five hours every day resulting in regulation, short termination, diversion, and cancellation of trains. However, Railways said priority will be given to long-distance Mail and Express trains.

The release said goods traffic would also be restricted and diverted during this period.

rain schedules to be affected; long-distance trains to get priority

The Southen Railways is on the threshold of completing the project to provide double tracks between Shoranur and Mangalore, which will, once completed, enable railways to run more trains at greater speed. At present about 50 trains move in both directions on this 307-km section.

The final stage of the work, which will be done mostly manually and would require disconnection of power lines, will involve major signalling and engineering work. This will ensure the new line between Karakkad and Shoranur are linked and made to work effectively along with existing single track.

The Railways have planned to undertake the work between September 25 and October 16.

Under the project, there will be an additional platform line (Platform No.7) to hold 26 coaches at Shoranur while the length of the Platform 2 and 4 would be increased by 30 to 50 m so that long trains can be handled, a release said. A new lay-bye line to hold three engines would help the railways avoid delay in change of engines of express or passenger trains, the release added.

The Pre-Stressed Concrete sleepers will replace the wooden sleeper points for better safety of the running trains. During the final phase of work, signals and the interlocking system which ensures safety of trains will be not be available. As a result trains will move slower across Shoranur.

Train movement will be stopped for five hours every day resulting in regulation, short termination, diversion, and cancellation of trains. However, Railways said priority will be given to long-distance Mail and Express trains.

The release said goods traffic would also be restricted and diverted during this period.

Union minister V. Kishore Chandra Deo has proposed Visakhapatnam as coastal Andhra’s capital and a realignment of rail zones, including shifting the South Eastern Railway headquarters from Calcutta, once Telangana is created.

Deo, a Congress MP from Visakhapatnam (Vizag) that is part of coastal Andhra, has made the suggestions in a letter to a committee headed by defence minister A.K. Antony. The panel is examining how the concerns of the region can be addressed and a smooth division of Andhra made possible.

Deo’s proposal is aimed at minimising the impact from Telangana’s creation and the plan to rearrange railway zones is aimed at giving Visakhapatnam extra amenities.

Zonal headquarters bring a lot of development work, jobs for many residents and work for labourers to maintain the railway network.

The rail network in coastal Andhra now comes under South-Central Railway, based at Secunderabad in the Telangana region. Once Telangana is created, coastal Andhra will be deprived of any railway zone headquarters, Deo said.

He has proposed shifting the headquarters of the East Coast Railway, now located in Odisha capital Bhubaneswar, to Visakhapatnam.

To compensate Odisha, the South Eastern Railway (SE) hub should be transferred from Calcutta to Bhubaneswar, the Union tribal affairs minister has said.

But the suggestion has raised hackles in Bengal and Odisha.

Asked about the Calcutta-related proposal, junior railway minister Adhir Chowdhury said “there’s no such plan.”

Trinamul spokesperson Derek O’Brien said he hadn’t heard about the idea. “It would be unfair for me to comment on what the minister has said.”

But another Trinamul leader mocked the Congress. “They (the Congress) are not sure whether they will last the next six months and now they say they want to shift (railway) offices.”

The outcry was shriller in Odisha, with the ruling Biju Janata Dal (BJD) planning demonstrations at stations for three days from tomorrow. State Congress and the BJP leaders have also slammed the idea.

“The headquarters of the East Coast Railway were set up in Bhubaneswar in 2003 after a long struggle. The proposal seems to be a conspiracy hatched by the Congress-led UPA government. We must oppose it unitedly,” finance minister and senior BJD leader Prasanna Acharya said.

But Deo said “the whole thing has been misunderstood” while adding he had not written to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh or railway minister Mallikarjun Kharge on the issue.

“It is not my intention to deprive Odisha. If my suggestion is accepted, the entire rail network of Odisha will come under the SE zone (based in Calcutta). I have suggested that the SE headquarters be shifted first. Then the EC headquarters can be relocated to Visakhapatnam.”

Bhubaneswar: Ruling BJD to start 1-hr dharna at railway stations across Odisha from Sept 12 to 14 protesting against Union minister V Kishore Deo's demand for shifting of ECoR office to Vizag. This was informed by the BJD Youth Wing President Sanjay Dasverma at Bhubaneswar today. It may be noted that Deo has sent a letter to the Antony Committee, constituted by the Central government to assess the situation resulted from the announcement to form separate Telangana state, arguing, “Vishakhapatnam is situated at the centre of the east coast between Kolkata and Chennai, the East Coast Railways Headquarters which should have been located at Vishakhapatnam is unfortunately established at Bhubaneswar.” The Union minister had also stated, “The South Eastern Zonal Railway Headquarters (currently in Kolkata) may be shifted to Bhubaneswar with the Khurda division attached to it and the East Coast Zonal Headquarters must be shifted to Vishakhapatnam with the addition of Vijayawada Division in the lieu of Khurda Division.” Deo suggested that the South Eastern Zonal Railway Headquarters should be shifted from Kolkata to Bhubaneswar as “by no stretch of imagination can Kolkata be said to be any part of the South Eastern region.”

Kochi: Divisional Railway Manager Rajesh Agarwal will take the passenger from Kottayam to Ernakulam on Thursday, interacting with commuters and seeing for himself the conditions at small stations and the problems commuters face.

Agarwal will travel with over 200 passengers who are regular commuters, and later kick off the Onam celebrations at the Ernakulam South railway station.

“This will be the first time in the country when such a top official will be travelling along with the commuters to study their problems. He has agreed to receive petitions personally from the passengers and interact with them”, said All Kerala Rail Users Association president Paul K.J. Manvettom.

Agarwal will welcome Maveli before boarding the Kollam-Kottayam-Ernakulam passenger from Kottayam at 6.30 am on Thursday.

Commuters plan to highlight a host of issues which include the non-entry of trains into the main platform in small stations like Piravom Road.

Later, he will join passengers in distributing chips and sweets to the railway staff and other passengers at Ernakulam junction.

मथुरा: रेलवे जंक्शन पर विश्वस्तरीय सुविधाओं के दावे। मगर पानी जैसी आम सुविधा भी मुहैया नहीं हो पा रही है रेलयात्रियों को। बुधवार को बच्चों के लिए पानी की जुगत में सर्कुलेटिंग एरिया में घूम रहे एक यात्री को टिकट कलक्टर ने पकड़ लिया। जैसे-तैसे जुर्माना से बच पाया।
कोटा से आए रामकुमार ट्रेन से उतर कर सरकुलेटिंग एरिया में आए गए। बच्चे प्यासे थे, वह पानी के लिए प्लेटफॉर्म पर पहुंचे। प्लेटफॉर्म पर जाते वक्त उनको टिकट ले जाने का ध्यान नहीं रहा, चेकिंग के दौरान टीसी ने पकड़ लिया। फोन कर अपने बच्चे को बुलाया और टिकट दिखाया। ग्वालियर से आए अवनीश सिंह को सर्कुलेटिंग एरिया में पीने को पानी नहीं मिला, तो वह रेलवे की व्यवस्थाओं को कोसते दिखे। उनका कहना था कि कहने को यह धार्मिक नगरी है, पर मूलभूत सुविधाएं भी नहीं हैं।
हकीकत है, जंक्शन रेलवे स्टेशन के सर्कुलेटिंग एरिया में यात्रियों को पेयजल और शौचालय जैसी सुविधाएं भी नहीं मिल रही हैं। यात्री सर्कुलेटिंग एरिया में आने के बाद फिर से प्लेटफॉर्म पर पहुंचता है तो चेकिंग के दौरान पकड़ा जाता है और उसे परेशानी झेलनी पड़ती है। रेलवे प्रशासन द्वितीय एवं तृतीय एंट्री के निर्माण कार्य में इतना व्यस्त है कि वह इस एरिया में यात्रियों को सुविधा मुहैया कराने पर ध्यान ही नहीं दे रहा है। यह हाल तो जब है कि जंक्शन को व‌र्ल्ड क्लास स्टेशन की श्रेणी में शामिल किया गया है। इस एरिया की सड़क भी जर्जर पड़ी है। पीआरओ भूपेंदर ढिल्लन का कहना है कि यात्रियों की समस्या का समाधान कराया जाएगा।

AGARTALA: The Northeast Frontier Railway (NFR) has prepared a masterplan to establish railway connectivity between the northeastern states, Bangladesh and Myammar.

According to NFR chief engineer (construction) Harpal Singh, a survey of one of the proposed railway projects connecting Tripura, Mizoram, Manipur, Nagaland, Arunachal Pradesh and Myanmar has already begun.

He said, according to the plan sanctioned by the Indian Railways, a 252-km railway track would be laid between Jawharnagar, the headquarters of Dhalai district in Tripura, and Darlong city of Myanmar through Kolasib, a town in Mizoram.

"Survey of the 109-km railway line between Jawharnagar and Kolashib has started and the rest 148-km track, between Kolasib and Darlong, will be surveyed in the next phase. If all goes well, track-laying would begin in the next few years," said Singh.

Survey of the route from Jiribam to Moreh and then to Tamu in Myanmar via Imphal is expected to be completed by next March, said Singh. Survey for the route connecting Aizawl and Myanmar from Sairang covering 226 km has already started, he added.

Railway authorities have also sanctioned funds for a feasibility study of a link between Belonia in Tripura and Chittagong in Bangladesh.

Two more short distance routes are being considered. One of them would be a 80-km track connecting Panisagar in Tripura to Simanapur in Mizoram, while another would be a 45-km track connecting Patharkandhi in Assam to Kanmun in Mizoram, Singh added.

NFR is all set to issue work order to Ircon International Ltd to lay the railway tracks linking Agartala with Akhaura of Bangladesh, as per the bilateral agreements during the last visit of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to Dhaka, Singh said.

Bhubaneswar: Ruling BJD to start 1-hr dharna at railway stations across Odisha from Sept 12 to 14 protesting against Union minister V Kishore Deo's demand for shifting of ECoR office to Vizag. This was informed by the BJD Youth Wing President Sanjay Dasverma at Bhubaneswar today. It may be noted that Deo has sent a letter to the Antony Committee, constituted by the Central government to assess the situation resulted from the announcement to form separate Telangana state, arguing, “Vishakhapatnam is situated at the centre of the east coast between Kolkata and Chennai, the East Coast Railways Headquarters which should have been located at Vishakhapatnam is unfortunately established at Bhubaneswar.” The Union minister had also stated, “The South Eastern Zonal Railway Headquarters (currently in Kolkata) may be shifted to Bhubaneswar with the Khurda division attached to it and the East Coast Zonal Headquarters must be shifted to Vishakhapatnam with the addition of Vijayawada Division in the lieu of Khurda Division.” Deo suggested that the South Eastern Zonal Railway Headquarters should be shifted from Kolkata to Bhubaneswar as “by no stretch of imagination can Kolkata be said to be any part of the South Eastern region.”

Indian officials working out a deal to build air-conditioned train coaches for Bangladesh have been perplexed by a request from Dhaka: fit these coaches with ceiling fans and replace most of the sealed glass windows with shutters.

Bangladesh requires 67 AC three-tier coaches to upgrade its passenger services. A modern AC coach costs about Rs 2.5 crore.

Indian officials tried explaining that AC coaches do not require fans and that their windows are sealed for a reason; though some emergency windows can be manually removed if needed.

The officials, however, soon realised that the Bangladesh Railways indeed wanted their AC coaches to have a unique design. And needless to say, they had to defer to wishes of the customer.

"Their requirement seems to be different from ours. We will design the coaches the way they want," said Railway Board chairman Arunendra Kumar.

Though Bangladesh has not specified a reason for such unusual requirement, Indian officials believe the neighbouring country wants to have the advantage of dual use of coaches, that is, they can be used even without switching on the AC.

Bangladesh is an old customer of Indian Railways. India has supplied 26 broad gauge 3,100 HP diesel electric locomotives to the Bangladesh Railway and fairly regularly exports spare parts of rolling stock.

East Coast Railway (ECoR) has achieved record loading performance during August to become the largest freight loading zone of Indian Railways.ECoR has loaded 12.41 million tonnes of freight in August posting an increase of 26.4 per cent over the corresponding month last year.From the first five months of the current fiscal 2013-14, ECoR has loaded 61.83 million tonnes of freight as compared to 52.28 million tonnes during the corresponding period last year with an increase of 18.3 per cent.

Revenue has also increased with ECoR earning Rs 4,878.46 crore in the first five months of the current financial year, which is 18.2 per cent more than the corresponding period last year.

ECoR had earned Rs 4,127.02 crore during the first five months of 2012-13.  In August, ECoR earned Rs 932.28 crore in originating goods as compared to Rs 754.27 crore achieved in same month last year.

Incremental loading of ECoR is the highest in Indian Railways surpassing the loading figure of South-East Central Railway at 60.98 million tonnes and South Eastern Railway at 55.47 million tonnes of freight till August 2013.

During August, South East Central Railway loaded 11.465 million tonnes and South Eastern Railway loaded 11.05 million tonnes of freight, while ECoR loaded 12.41 million tonnes.