Jammu, Gulberga, Silchar to be new railway divisions

New Delhi: Catering to the growing demand for new divisions, railways have decided to create three new ones - Jammu, Gulberga and Silchar. The railway minister has announced the creation of three new divisons in Jammu, Gulberga and Silchar and steps are being taken accordingly, chairman Railway Board Arunendra Kumar said.[caption id=“attachment_1411517” align=“alignleft” width=“380”]  New railway zones coming up. AFP[/caption] Currently, Jammu is in Ferozpur division of the Northern Railway zone and if Jammu becomes a division then it will be the first rail division in Jammu and Kashmir. Gulberga in Karnataka is in the Pallakad division of Southern Railway and Silchar in Assam is in Lumding division of North East Frontier zone. Kumar, however, ruled out the possibility of creating more zones in near future. Meanwhile, keeping the financial constraint in mind, railways have prioritised 31 projects involving doubling, gauge conversion and electrification for executions in the current fiscal. As on April 2013, there are 368 ongoing projects of new line, gauge conversion and doubling having a throw forward of Rs 1,78,216 crores with limited availability of resources. Therefore, projects are progressing as per availability of resources. “Keeping the present scenario in mind, we have selected 31 projects to be executed on priority,” Kumar said. All the ongoing projects were discussed in details in the recent General Managers’ conference and it was decided that certain projects have to be shortlisted for speedy execution. Asked whether the gross budgetary support of Rs 29,000 will be adequate to execute ongoing projects, CRB said “that is why we have prioritised the projects.” Lumding-Silchar gauge conversion, Tinpahar-Kahalgaon doubling, Siwan-Horakhpur-Barabanki electrification, Pathankot-Jammu-Udhampur electrification are some of the 31 projects to be exceuted on priority. On the opening of Udhampur-Katra rail link, Kumar said the report of Commissioner Railway Safety which has inspected the line is awaited. PTI