Silchar, Nov. 19: A war of words has broken out between the Congress and the BJP over taking credit for bringing broad-gauge tracks to the Barak Valley with the commencement of the Silchar-Lumding passenger train on Saturday.
The Cachar unit of the BJP gave all the credit to Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the implementation of the project, which had faced innumerable delays.
"It was because of Modi ji that the broad-gauge project finally saw the light of day. The project had been going on at a snail's pace under the Congress regime. The pace of work increased only after the BJP came to power in the Centre. We thank Modiji for his sincere efforts to transform the project into reality," Rajdip Roy, general secretary of Assam BJP, said here today.
When told the Congress had claimed that 90 per cent of the project was completed under the UPA rule, Roy said the people of Barak Valley would assess who had done what for its completion.
Advertisements by the Congress claim that former Union minister and former Silchar MP Santosh Mohan Dev is the man behind implementation of the Silchar-Lumding broad-gauge project. The advertisements published in local dailies today also had the picture of Dev and a newspaper cutting of the foundation stone-laying ceremony.
PCC spokesperson Depan Dewanjee said the BJP was trying to ignore history. "The NDA came to power in April last year but the announcement of the mega block work that started on October 1 last year was made in January. In fact, the project was supposed to be completed by March this year."
Union minister for railways Suresh Prabhakar Prabhu will flag off the 55616 Silchar-Guwahati fast passenger on Saturday at 10.30am from Rail Bhavan, New Delhi, via video-conferencing. Union minister of state for railways Manoj Sinha and the Union minister for sports and youth affairs Sarbananda Sonowal will be present at Silchar railway station for the flagging-off ceremony.
An NF Railway official told this correspondent today that the regular passenger train service would begin from Monday. The 55616 Silchar-Guwahati fast passenger will leave Silchar everyday at 5am and reach Guwahati at 5.15pm. Similarly, the 55615 Guwahati-Silchar train would leave Guwahati at 11.55pm everyday and reach Silchar at 1.10pm the next day.
Former Prime Minister H.D. Deve Gowda in the presence of then Union railway minister Ram Vilas Paswan laid the foundation stone of the project in April 1996. The project, which was declared a "national project" by former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh in 2004, has seen the cost balloon to over Rs 3,500 crore from Rs 658 crore.
The commencement of the train service along the Silchar-Lumding route will facilitate connectivity between Guwahati and Cachar district for 36 lakh people living in the Barak Valley in the project's first phase. In the second phase, these benefits would be accorded to Tripura and Mizoram and a part of Manipur.
The 210km Silchar-Lumding broad-gauge route has 21 tunnels, 79 major bridges, 340 small bridges and 28 crossing stations with four halts.
NF Railway general manager Mohd Jamshed has signed the safety certificate for running the passenger train regularly. The permissible speed of the train is 60km per hour from Lumding to New Haflong, 30km per hour from New Haflong to Dittekcherra, 50km per hour from Dittekcherra to Chandranathpur and 70km per hour from Chandranathpur to Silchar.
The first broad-gauge engine chugged into Silchar on March 13 and just three days later, a special light goods train with higher officials of NF Railway reached here. Freight trains are now plying on the route regularly.
