BHUBANESWAR: The Centre has blamed the State government for the delay in completion of Talcher-Bimlagarh rail link project. Replying to questions from BJD MP Mahesh Sahoo and BJP MP Jual Oram, Union Minister of Railways Piyush Goyal said only the 20-km-long Talcher-Sunakhani section of the project has been completed.
He said work has been taken up in 23.5 km length from Sunakhani station (20 km to 43.50 km) and the State government has to expedite land acquisition and handing over of balance 916 acre land.
“Completion of any railway project depends on various factors like quick land acquisition by State government, forest clearance, shifting of infringing utilities, statutory clearances from various authorities, geological and topographical conditions of area, law and order situation in the project site, and number of working months available in a year for a particular project site due to climatic conditions. All these factors affect the completion time of the project,” he said in a written reply.
The Minister said the anticipated cost of Talcher-Bimlagarh (149.74 km) newline project is Rs 1,928 crore. An expenditure of Rs 839 crore has been incurred so far. While the budget outlay of Rs 140 crore was provided in 2020-21, only `10 crore provision is made for the 2021-22 fiscal.
He said regular meetings are being held with the officials of State government and authorities concerned to resolve the pending issues obstructing the progress of projects and ensure timely completion without cost overrun.
Meanwhile, the East Coast Railway (ECoR) has revised the deadline for the project to March 2023. When the project was sanctioned in 2003-04, the Centre had fixed 2012 as the deadline for completion.
Responding to another query on Angul-Sukinda (104 km) rail project, Goyal said it is being executed by the joint venture (JV) company Angul - Sukinda Railway Limited (ASRL) - under concession by the Ministry of Railways under participative mode.
The project is under progress and targeted for completion by June, 2022. The project is being executed under PPP mode and the funding is sourced from equity and debt of the ASRL.