Jai
Jagannath,
Complete Budget Details
Yesterday honerable railway minister
Sri. Lalu Prasad Yadav opened the Pandora's box and took out 10
Garib Raths and 53 new trains in his fifth Railway Budget, while
announcing an extension of 16 trains. He introduced four new trains
New Trains :
1. Bhubaneshwar-Mumbai Express (Bi-weekly) via Sambalpur,
2. Puri-Darbhanga Express (Weekly)
3. Paradeep-Bhubaneshwar Express (Daily) in lieu of one pair
passenger service between Paradeep and Cuttack.
4. Kendurjharagarh-Puri Express (Daily)
Extension of Trains :
1. 8611/8612 Varanasi-Ranchi to Sambalpur via Rourkela (Bi weekly)
Increase in frequency :
1. 2891/2892 Baripada-Bhubaneswar Express from tri-weekly to six
days a week
2. 2421/2422 Bhubaneswar-New Delhi Rajdhani Express from bi-weekly
to tri-weekly
Orissa has got an allocation of only Rs.972 crore only against the
demand of Rs.1,300.30 crore. No new links have been sanctioned to
backward regions of Kalahandi, Koraput and Bolangir.
Broadly visualizing the scenario, Orissa is ever treated like a step
son of central government may be because of the insufficient
governance at the state and ignorant MPs representing us at the
centre, We lost 50 golden years. Orissa is now crowned as the third
richest state of investment in India, the most favorite destination
of industrialists, Excellent at progress report and thus a front
runner among smart states. This couldn't happen for the rest 50
years, else Orissa could have been better than with Germany or
Japan. Only during the tenures of a great technocrat and industrial
architect Sir Biju Pattanaik and his son Sri Naveen Pattanaik as
chief ministers, that the state has received & is receiving a royal
treatment.
Hats off to the two most handsome chief
ministers of Orissa, the father son duo.
Father gifted Orissa a steel plant at Rourkela ( benefiting 10 lakh
people and livelihood), Paradeep Phosphate limited - PPL, ALCO, HAL,
REC, Nandankanan and many more. Son is gifted Orissa with
2,37,00,000 crores of foreign investment, 26 steel plants, 7 air
ports, 6 SEZs, 4 sea ports ( Dhamara, Gopalpur, Kirtania, New
Paradeep ) and unlimited happiness.
For the rest of the 50 years the sharp edge injuries of political
negligence, improper planning and lack of intelligent MPs at centre
had certainly manhandled Orissa . Extreme negligence by South
Eastern Railways paralyzed Orissa and revenue was looted from Orissa
by other states. Ever seen the net like woven rail network in UP,
Bihar and West Bengal. And in Orissa there is only two links (
Howrah - Bombay and Howrah - Madras ), that too non-electrocuted for
decades.
Orissa Govt. was loosing 3600 crores per year of revenue to the
hands of West Bengal Govt. due to mineral ore transportation via
Haldia Port. Ores and minerals were looted from Orissa thru
following five feeder rail links to Haldia port thru howrah - Bombay
main line. These would have been the major vital revenue generating
rail links for govt. of Orissa. Haldia port trust was doing major
business with goods and ores from Orisa and our Govt. were sitting
ducks. The five feeder links looting Orissa were
1. Rajakharasuan - Barbil rail link
2. Bandhamunda - Raxi rail link
3. Tata - Badam pahada rail link
4. Rajakharasuan - Bansapani rail link
5. Tata - Goru mahisani rail link
Imagine these 5 railway link lines were like 5 fingers of a hand
that was put inside Orissa's pot and stealing sweets for years.
These railway links were doing the same, looting our ores and
minerals to a port in another state thus our state loosing export
duties and customs worth of 3600 crores per year. Our Governments
were sitting like ducks.
MP Sri. Anant Nayak was the first person to raise an alarm on this
issue in Parliament. In 1973 Sir Biju Pattanaik planned to rail link
Bansapani with Jakhapura to reach Paradeep Port. During 1993-94
Railway minister Kanhu Charan Lenka executed the project and it got
completed with the catalytic efforts of Sri. Naveen Pattanaik with a
green signal from Railway minister Sri. Lalu Prasad Yadav ( Of
course with another holy intension of connecting Bihar with Puri
dham in a shortest possible rail link) followed by extension of
several trains to Puri. Thus our main objective was partially
achieved. Other potential revenue generating rail links like
Bimalagarh - Talcher, Keonjhar - Badam Pahar, Keonjhar - Barsuan is
still to be constructed and prioritized.
In Howrah - Madras coast line Vijayanagaram - Kharagpur section that
covers whole of Orissa was deliberately ignored till 1993. All
trains have to run on diesel engines in this section inside Orissa
and rest part of eastern railway was electrocuted. This was like an
insult to Orissa. In 1993 then railway minister Sri. Kanhu charan
Lenka under guidance and supervision of his majesty Sir. Biju
Pattanaik planned and started Electric - traction work and completed
the same in 2005.
---- > Paradeep Port was intentionally not connected to any of the
mines or Industries in Orissa, to ensure Orissa govt. loose the
custom export duties. Recently it got connected to Howrah - Madras
main line ( after 30 years of the port been built )
---- > Internal rail links were neither connecting major cities of
Orissa to each other nor to our only port Paradeep.
---- > Major city railway station were maintained like "C" grade
stations due to lack of funding. Bhubaneswar being the capitol of
Orissa, was having only 3 medium sized platforms, underdeveloped
comparative to any rail junctions in AP or WB.
---- > Our MPs were neither sincere nor regular to Parliament. If
few of them went to parliament they were sitting at far corners and
sleeping for times. Back home they were kept ignorant of all these
and were even in some cases told by party state head office not to
raise such issues in Parliament. Even some MPs were unable to read
and analyze the railway time table and map.
---- > Due to lack of proper rail line network inside Orissa, each
day around 20 to 25 thousand heavy vehicles were running thru the
state. Result was high risk to citizens and terrible condition of
highways.
---- > Jagannath Dham, puri one of the most popular hub of world
cultural heritage was not properly connected with other parts of
India with rail and road lines. 20 pairs of trains run to puri on a
daily basis, but surprisingly on a single line. Puri railway station
lacks sufficient platforms, passenger amenities and even a central
terminal facility. On the contrary Tirupati railway station is well
connected to Chennai, Gudur, Hyderabad, Bangalore. As like Tirupati,
Puttaparthy & Madurai, Puri neither has a helipad nor airport.
Thanks to Naveen Pattanaik government at least that due to his
repeated efforts POSCO is going to construct Puri - Konark -
Paradeep rail line for 100 kilometer.
Any way the days are brighter days ahead as governance is good now.
We are entering into a evolutionary revolution of prosperity. Wish
Lord Jagannath protect us from all beurocracy. Find attached the
complete rail Budget 2008.
Regards
Nilachakra
|