RailEnquiry

JAMSHEDPUR: The assurance made by railway minister Mukul Roy to include the road over bridge (ROB) proposal in the railway supplementary budget for the current fiscal has rekindled hopes of early redressal of the long-pending issue of traffic congestion on the accident prone Jugsalai level crossing.Over 1 lakh people residing in the densely populated Jugsalai municipal area and in adjoining Baghbera have been confronting problems in traveling to and from the city every day for the past several decades owing to poor level-crossing infrastructure. However, following persistent effort made by the Jamshedpur MP Dr Ajay Kumar, the railway minister Roy agreed to include the ROB project in the supplementary budget for the current fiscal."It took sometime to convince the railway minister about the sensitivity of the issue. Finally he agreed and and assured me that he would include the long-pending proposal in the supplementary budget for 2012-13," Dr Kumar said adding that he looks forward to an early start of the construction work. Dr Kumar had met Roy early this month.The need for the ROB at the railway level crossing has been necessitated given the manifold increase in vehicular traffic in the last few years.

"In just five to seven minutes (when the traffic is stopped at the level crossing to ensure smooth passage of the trains) the vehicles queue stretches to long distance causing difficulties for pedestrians to move freely on the stretch," said Manjeet Singh, a local resident who runs a shop near the level crossing.

This railway crossing separates the two main pass of the city namely Jugsalai and Bistupur. Several fatal accidents have taken place at the level crossing in the past several years as people, in hurry, tend to walk over the level crossing without paying adequate attention to the movement of trains. Over two dozen trains including passenger and goods trains ply through the level crossing round the clock, each day.

"GM SER A K Verma has assured me of completing the necessary paper work and forward it to the ministry in the next 10 days time," said Dr Kumar.

The state government has approved the project and is ready to finance 50 per cent of project cost. The Union government has to fund the remaining 50 per cent of the project cost. The total cost of the project is around Rs 12 crore.