Deadline shift, ownership issues with new Kolkata metro rail corridor

Instead of 2013, land acquisition headaches push completion to 2016 talks on for possible shift of overall charge from Union urban development ministry to rail ministry

The Kolkata Metro Rail Corporation’s east-west corridor project, considered close to Trinamool Party chief and state chief minister Mamata Banerjee’s heart, is set to miss the completion date of 2013.

Top officials with the project gave 2016 as the target date today, citing land acquisition problems as the main reason for delay.

Ownership of the corridor is also becoming an issue. Although the Union urban development (UD) ministry is the administrative one for the project, high-level talks are on to assess whether to transfer this to the ministry of railways.

The original Kolkata Metro project, making operational losses, was initially a joint venture between the central UD ministry and the West Bengal government but was subsequently taken over by the ministry of railways.

At a conference today on the status of the project, Union UD secretary Sudhir Krishna and KMRC managing director Subrata Gupta refused to comment on the issue of change in ownership. They said such decisions were taken at another level.

Officials, who did not want to be named, noted funding of corridor could be jeopardised if the stakeholders or ownership changed. The UD ministry, with the department of economic affairs in the Union ministry of finance, had sought a Rs 2,253-crore loan for the project from the Japan International Cooperation Agency (coordinating all aid-giving activity of the Japanese government), of which Rs 450 crore has already been drawn.

The 14.58-km line between Howrah Maidan and Salt Lake, approved by the central government in 2008-09, is to charge more than the existing Kolkata Metro. The latter, in use since 1984 as the country’s first metro rail line, has not seen any ticket price rise in 10 years. For every Rs 100 earned, it spends Rs 226. Its target loss for 2011-12 is Rs 84 crore.

The approved project completion cost for the corridor was Rs 4,874.6 crore and Rs 900 crore has already been spent. KMRC is to build and maintain it.