NITI Aayog has decided to commission the proposed 15-km India-Bangladesh railway project along Tripura by 2017, a top state official said on Friday.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Bangladesh Premier Sheikh Hasina discussed during the former's visit to Dhaka on June 6-7 the Rs.575-crore ($90 million) railway project.
It was finalised in January 2010 during Hasina's meeting with the then Indian prime minister Manmohan Singh in New Delhi.
"NITI (National Institution for Transforming India) Aayog on Thursday decided in a meeting in Delhi to put in place the vital railway project between India and Bangladesh by December 2017," Tripura transport secretary Samarjit Bhowmik told IANS.
Bhowmik, who returned here on Friday after attending the NITI Aayog meeting, said: "The alignment and other technicalities of laying the track to link Agartala railway station with Bangladesh's Akhaura railway station would be changed. A final report on the new alignment will be submitted to the centre by June 30 for sanction of funds."
NITI Aayog's advisor Animesh Singh presided over the Delhi meeting, where officials of ministries of railway, development of northeastern eegion (DoNER) and external affairs and the Tripura government participated.
The NITI Aayog meeting was held to remove the roadblocks on the Agartala-Akhaura rail project along Tripura capital Agartala. Of the 15 km, 5 km fall in the Indian territory and the remaining in Bangladesh.
"On the Indian side, some portion of the track is likely to be elevated," the official said.
"The central government is yet to provide funds, resulting in delay in land acquisition and subsequent works," a top state government official, who did not wish to be named, told IANS.
He said the state government recently approached the railway ministry again to allocate funds. "No funds were allocated in the railway budget for 2015-16, even for land acquisition," the official said.
The project cost was earlier estimated at Rs.271 crore. In addition, Rs.302 crore was needed to acquire around 91 acres of land in India for laying the track.
Bhowmik said that India's External Affairs ministry would provide funds to lay track in the 10-km Bangladesh territory.
"Earlier DoNER ministry had committed to provide funds to lay tracks on the Indian side. But in Thursday's NITI Aayog meeting, the DoNER ministry categorically expressed its inability to give funds. Railway ministry is now likely to provide funds for the Tripura part of the project," the official added.
State-owned Indian Railway Construction Company (IRCON) is expected to lay the tracks on both sides of the border. The Northeast Frontier Railway is the nodal agency for the project, for which alignment of rail line and other technical details were earlier finalised by officials of both India and Bangladesh.
Tripura transport minister Manik Dey said: "The new railway connectivity between the northeastern state and Bangladesh will boost socio-economic, trade and business ties between the two countries. After the commissioning of the railway project, Tripura would act as a corridor to the southeast Asian countries."
Dey told IANS: "It would become cost-effective to ferry men and material between the two countries and between mountainous northeast region and other parts of India via Bangladesh once the railway project is completed."
The 1,650-km distance between Agartala and Kolkata would be reduced to only 515 km once the rail track is constructed through Bangladesh.
