NEW DELHI: Railway Minister Lalu Prasad will convene a meeting of the Chief Ministers of Kerala and Tamil Nadu to find a way out of the differences that have cropped up between the two States over the bifurcation of the Palakkad Division of the Indian Railway to create a separate Salem Division.

This was announced here on Thursday by Kerala's Law and Parliamentary Affairs Minister M. Vijayakumar after he met Mr. Prasad along with a delegation of Members of Parliament from the State.

Mr. Prasad is expected to make this intervention ahead of the Budget session.

The delegation also met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to seek his intervention in preventing the creation of the Salem Division at the expense of the Palakkad Division.

`Not against division'

Maintaining that they had nothing against the creation of the Salem Division, the Kerala delegation's key contention was that it should not affect the financial viability of the Palakkad Division.

In a memorandum, the delegation pointed out that the Palakkad Division was one of the oldest divisions of Southern Railway and the first headquartered in Kerala. Concerned about the manner in which the Palakkad Division was being halved to create Salem, they questioned the logic in taking away such a large chunk of the track under the mother division to create a new one.

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