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Members of Nagrik Sangharsh Samiti sit on a dharna in Jugsalai on Saturday. Picture by Bhola Prasad
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Jamshedpur, Sept. 8: Over 200 persons including leaders of political parties today staged a dharna near the Jugsalai intersection under the banner of Nagrik Sangharsh Samiti to protest against delay in overbridge and railway underbridge projects in the locality.
The dharna lasted more than five hours, with the agitators threatening to stage a rail blockade no immediate progress is made in the projects, which have been pending for five years.
The road overbridge project is estimated at Rs 15 crore while the underbridge is pegged at Rs 6 crore, with both billed to be set up with equal sharing of costs by the state government and the rail ministry.
The projects were aimed at decongest traffic at the Jugsalai level crossing. Over two lakh commuters use the stretch connecting Bistupur, Adityapur and Jugsalai to Tatanagar station daily.
Convener of the samiti Shailender Singh said the railways had in principle agreed to the projects while Tata Steel and the state government had issued no-objection certificates. However, despite assurances, the railways had not yet sanctioned the projects in either its annual or supplementary budget this year, he added.
“Chakradharpur divisional manager of South Eastern Railway (SER) Achal Khare had given us an assurance in April 2011 that the projects would be included in the budget. He had also said that proposals had been sent to the general manager of SER (Calcutta) and through it to the railway board. But nothing has been done so far,” said Singh.
BJP district president Raj Kumar Srivastava, state unit chief Dineshanand Goswami, Ajsu district head Anand Bihari Dubey, JMM’s Jugsalai block president Mohammed Jamil and JVM leader Kishore Yadav also spoke at the dharna.
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