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Udhampur-Banihal railway line to be completed within a year: Vaishnaw
Addressing a press conference at the Srinagar railway station in Nowgam area here, Union railways minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said the Udhampur-Banihal track, connecting Jammu with Srinagar, will be completed by December this year, or early next year
The railway line connecting the Kashmir valley with the rest of the country will be completed this year, and special Vande Bharat trains will chug in the union territory next year, Union railways minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said on Saturday.
Addressing a press conference at the Srinagar railway station in Nowgam area here, he said the Udhampur-Banihal track, connecting Jammu with Srinagar, will be completed by December this year, or early next year.
“There is a good progress on the Udhampur-Srinagar-Baramulla rail line. The work on the Chenab and Anji bridges, and major tunnels are also going on,” Vaishnaw said.
He said a specially designed Vande Bharat train is being manufactured for this line.
“Every factor like temperature and snow has been kept in mind while manufacturing this special train. Once the railway line is opened, you will have the Vande Bharat train in the middle of 2024,” he added.
Asked about the delay in completing the project, the Union minister said there was less funding before Prime Minister Narendra Modi took over in 2014.
“The cost of the project is ₹35,000 crore. They used to get only ₹700- ₹800 crore per year. After Modi came to power, he doubled it. Then tripled it and now has increased the funding six times of what it was,” Vaishnaw said.
Vaishnaw said there also were technical reasons for the delay.
“The Himalayas are young mountains, which means they are soft and tunnelling work is very difficult,” he said.
However, all big challenges have now been completed and difficult works have been done, he added.
Describing the Chenab railway bridge as an engineering marvel, the minister said it is one of the highest bridges in the world and the highest railway bridge in the country.
The Union railway minister said the Anji bridge will also be completed by August this year and after fine tuning works, it will be available for commissioning by September this year.
The minister also said the Railways has started a parcel booking facility in Srinagar, along with the department of posts, to send products by booking parcels from here to different parts of the country.
Vaishnaw, who is also the minister of communications and electronics and information technology, said every village and city in J&K will have a telecom facility. About 500 new mobile towers have been sanctioned for Ladakh and soon they will have good 4G/5G connectivity, he added.
