GREEN SIGNAL: A motor trolley being used to inspect the Sakleshpur-Kukke Subramanya stretch earlier this week.

BANGALORE: A picturesque stretch of the Western Ghats is being opened up by the Railways for passenger travel after a long wait of 13 years.

The Commissioner of Railway Safety (Southern Region) has certified the track between Sakleshpur in Hassan district and Subramanya Road in Dakshina Kannada district safe for passenger trains. The Hassan-Sakleshpur-Mangalore line will now add to the State's passenger train network. The 55-km stretch, passing through undulating terrain in the Western Ghats, posed many challenges during construction of the new broad-gauge line.

In his authorisation dated April 12, Chief Commissioner of Railway Safety Pranab Kumar Sen said he had inspected the stretch on April 10 and 11.

Speed trial

He said that after a speed trial on April 11, above 35 km an hour and a maximum speed of 40 km an hour, he was satisfied that safety provisions of the Indian Railway Act had been complied with.

Passenger trains on the stretch can now be operated at a maximum speed of 30 km an hour, subject to a temporary speed restriction of 15 km an hour between Shiribagilu and Subramanya Road, owing to the replacement of channel sleepers.

This will help in making train services promised in the Railway Budget become a reality. The trains includethe Bangalore (Yeshwantpur)-Arsikere-Mangalore Express (daily) during the day with stops at Tumkur, Arsikere and Hassan; and Bangalore (Yeshwantpur)-Mysore-

Mangalore Express (daily) during the night with stops at Kengeri, Ramanagaram, Channapatna, Maddur, Mysore, Krishnaraja Nagar, Sakleshpur, Hassan, Kabaka Puttur and Bantwal.

The coaches for these express trains have been kept ready, in anticipation of the safety certification. South Western Railway is now waiting for the green signal from the Railway Board to start these new trains. The 2005-06 Railway Budget has also proposed to extend the Mangalore-Kabaka Puttur passenger train (daily) up to Shravanabelagola.

The new track will boost connectivity between the State capital and the all-weather port town of Mangalore. It will also benefit people in Kasaragod and Kannur in north Kerala. While the distance from Mangalore to Chennai on the Southern Railway route via Palakkad is about 900 km and the running time is 18 hours, it will be only 725 km and 13 hours via Bangalore.

The meter-gauge railway line that was commissioned in 1979 between Arsikere and Mangalore was dismantled during 1994-95 for construction of a broad-gauge line. The gauge conversion work took a long time, even raising the suspicion that the road transport lobby was behind the inordinate delay. The work was completed in 2005 and goods trains began to run to Mangalore in 2006. The State Government too chipped in by in financially bearing around 50 per cent of the project cost under the K-RIDE project, through the Hassan-Mangalore Railway Development Corporation

Direct access

Mysore Special Correspondent writes:

Once the last link is cleared and passenger services are introduced, the vast hinterland of Mysore will have direct access to Mangalore.

This is also expected to give a boost to the tourism industry both in Mysore and Mangalore, as there is tremendous interest among people to explore coastal Karnataka and the picturesque route on the Hassan-Mangalore section. Although the Railways has announced three services to Mangalore from Mysore, we anticipate a great rush and, hence, additional services cannot be ruled out, sources said.

There was demand for a tourism counter at Hassan station, and the authorities here approved it, they said.

Printer friendly page  
Send this article to Friends by E-Mail