Indian Railways sanction survey for 14 new routes connecting neighboring countries

The total length of the Final Location Survey sanctioned is 1275.50 km. The total length of the Final Location Survey for New Railway Lines connecting Bangladesh is 861 km, and with Nepal is 202.5 km. The proposed alternate routes towards Northeast will be of 212 km length.

The sanctioned routes for FLS of Rail connectivity between India and Bangladesh are Balurghat – Hili – Parbatipur – Kaunia – Lalmanirhat – Mogalhat – Gitaldaha section. This will be 32 km out of which 14 km will be a new railway line and 18 km will be gauge conversion.

Sabyasachi De Chief Public Relations Officer of Northeast Frontier Railway (NFR) said that the alternate new route towards Northeast to be constructed between Forbesganj – Lakshamipur section will be of 17.60 km length. New route between Thakurganj – Chattarhat section will be of 24.40 km length. Kumedpur – Ambari Falakata new route will require construction of a 170 km new railway line.

The sanctioned route for Final Location Survey of Rail connectivity between India and Nepal is between Biratnagar – New Mal Jn section which will require construction of 190 km of new railway line. And the proposed Galgalia – Bhadrapur – Kajali Bazar section will require construction of a 12.5 km new railway line.

The above newly proposed railway lines will further strengthen connectivity through the chicken-neck portion. He added that the government of India is committed to developing friendly and mutually beneficial relations with all its neighbours under the ‘Neighbourhood First’ policy.

This policy will prioritise enhanced rail/road connectivity, infrastructure development and fostering greater people-to-people contacts. It will also develop better communication between neighbouring nations which will lead to significant increase in Trade & Tourism activities.