Prime Minister Narendra Modi is likely to flag two specially designed Vande Bharat trains running between Srinagar and Katra on June 6, which marks the completion of a project to connect Kashmir to the rest of the country, which was first launched 42 years ago.
The 272-cilometer long Udhampur-Srinagar-Baramulla railway line (USBRL) was the 111-km Katra-Banihal section, which ended in January. The PM was initially inaugurated on this section on 19 April, but the incident was canceled due to bad weather forecasting. The inauguration was delayed due to a terrorist attack in Pahgam in Kashmir on 22 April, followed by a conflict between India and Pakistan.
Vande India’s vehicles inaugurated by Modi include one from Katra to Srinagar and the other from Srinagar to Katra.
However, PM will not travel to Srinagar for this. Sources said that the government wants to inaugurate the line before celebrating the first anniversary of the third term of the third term of the Modi-left government on 9 June.
An official said: “PM will inaugurate the full vibe of USBRL, Chenb Bridge and Fix Bridge. Along with this, he will flag two Vande India vehicles for the route. All preparations have been completed. The security sector is getting bells.”
On Monday, the newly formed Jammu Division operated under the headquarters and Northern Railway at Jammu Tawi. The 70th division of Indian Railways will look after an adequate area, mainly with classes transferred from the existing Firozpur division, which is old as Indian Railways.
Currently, local trains are running at a distance of 184 km of USBRL between Ramban district of Jammu and Sangaldan in Baramullah in Kashmir and 25 km between Udampur and Katra in Jammu. It is a 63-km Katra-Sangaldon section that is waiting for the inauguration to complete the line.
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The estimated cost of the USBRL is more than Rs 43,000 crore, out of which Rs 35,000 crore was spent on the Katra-Banihal section.
The trains of Vande Bharat will run only between Srinagar and Katra, which was said by senior railway officials. Passengers going from Srinagar to Vande Bharat will have to change trains at Katra railway station. The same goes to the passengers traveling in the reverse direction, who will have to catch Vande India from Katra to Valley.
Earlier, it was reported that it was due to security reasons, further investigation was done after trains arriving or going to Srinagar. This was objected by political leaders in Kashmir, who said that it defeated the entire idea of a train for the valley.
A railway official told the Indian Express on Monday that trains coming from Kashmir will stop or start from Katra as work is going on on the expansion of Jammu railway yard. The work is expected to be completed by August-September and after that, passengers and passengers from Srinagar may come directly to Jammu, before taking trains to other places.
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It was in 1983 that the then Indira Gandhi-led Congress government laid the foundation stone for a Udhampur-Srinagar railway line.
However, after the NDA government led by AB Vajpayee, the work on the project gained momentum after the government declared it a national project in 2002.
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