Karnataka - Mysore   

MP blames Govt. for derailment of project

Staff Correspondent

MYSORE: The Mysore MP, C.H. Vijayshankar, has laid the blame for the derailment of Mysore-Bangalore double-track project squarely at the doorstep of the State Government.

Addressing presspersons here on Sunday, Mr. Vijayshankar said the Railway Board had declined to sanction the doubling of railway track between Ramanagaram and Mysore on account of the State Government's refusal to bear 50 per cent of the project cost.

Mr. Vijayshankar said he had written to the Railway Board Chairman, R.K. Singh, recently seeking to know the reasons for the delay in the project. In his reply, Mr. Singh pointed out that the project could not be sanctioned as the State Government had failed to honour the cost-sharing agreement signed with the Railways during the S.M. Krishna regime.

Quoting the Railway Board Chairman, Mr. Vijayshankar said the State Government was yet to pay its share of Rs. 48.82 crores towards track-doubling project, which had been taken up between Bangalore and Ramanagaram.

Expressing concern over the board's refusal to sanction the track-doubling project beyond Ramanagaram up to Mysore, Mr. Vijayshankar even noted that the work up to Ramanagaram was also slow because the State Government had not deposited its share of money for the project.

"The people of the region and the project should not suffer because of the confrontation between the State and Railways," he said and urged the Deputy Chief Minister, Siddaramaiah, who also holds the Finance portfolio, to immediately resolve the tangle and put the project back on track.

The Railways had signed an MoU with the Karnataka Government during Mr. Krishna's tenure as Chief Minister to execute the Rs. 220-crore project on a 50:50 cost-sharing basis.

But after the coalition Government assumed power last year, Mr. Siddaramaiah contended that the Railways was demanding the State Government to bear 60 per cent of the project cost. Expressing the State Government's inability to do so, he had urged the Railways to take up the project on its own.

Mr. Vijayshankar also revealed that the Centre had released Rs. 14.39 crores under the Prime Minister's Grameena Sadak Yojana for providing roads in Mysore district. The authorities would soon take up work on laying 99 km of road in rural areas ofq the district during 2005-06.

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