Trains to remote areas will soon gain steam

NITI Aayog may suggest connecting remote habitations through rail network as a different programme

As progress in laying new railway lines in hilly, remoter and hitherto unconnected habitations gets more focus, the central government is mulling a separate scheme or programme for giving impetus to this, on the lines of the Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana (PMGSY).

NITI Aayog, say officials, is expected to suggest separating the task of laying rail tracks and connecting remote habitations through the rail network as an entirely different programme, outside the current allocations. This is to give added focus and to ensure completion of such projects, many languishing for years.

“We need schemes like the National Highways Development Project (NHDP) and PMGSY in the railways. Even today, some parts of the Northeast and Odisha are not connected by rail,” a senior government official said. He said the Aayog will be asking the railways for a project report on the lines of PMGSY and NHDP. “We would like to make this a national priority. All districts of India should be on the railway map,” he added.

The ministry of railways in its 2004-05 Budget, during the tenure of current Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar, had announced a similar programme - Remote Area Rail Sampark Yojana - with an additional outlay of Rs 20,000 crore. It was aimed at completing all pending projects in remote and unconnected areas, and to undertake more initiatives.

The ministry had then estimated that once opened for traffic, these lines would also require about 18,000 persons per year for normal maintenance and operations. And, scope for indirect employment of close to 55,000 people a year.

However, the ministry in a written reply to a standing committee of Parliament in 2008-09 said the scheme could not take off. It said state governments didn’t show any interest in contributing their share of the funds – around two per cent of resources were to come from money collected by states from stamp duty on property transactions.

Officials said modelled on the lines of the PMGSY or NHDP, the new programme would help attract dedicated funds. PMGSY was launched in 2000 and the Centre has constructed over 400,000 km of roads under the scheme. In the 2017-18 Budget, the Centre had allocated Rs 19,000 crore for the programme, which along with states’ share will take the total funding to a little over Rs 27,000 crore.

Under NHDP, launched during the Vajpayee government, the Centre planned to upgrade, rehabilitate and widen the existing network of highways, plus building new ones. The project is to be completed in phases.