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Rail woes: Kerala to send all-party team to Delhi

Staff Reporter

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Kerala Chief Minister V.S. Achuthanandan has said that the State will send an all-party delegation to New Delhi to demand intervention of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Railway Minister Lalu Prasad to end all moves allegedly going on in Railways against Kerala.

Addressing a press conference after a meeting of MPs from the State here on Saturday, the Chief Minister said the delegation would also strive to get Central assistance to carry out relief operations for those affected by monsoon fury in the State. He said the delegation would leave for New Delhi after fixing an appointment with the Prime Minister.

The Chief Minister alleged that Minister of State for Railways R. Velu was indulging in ‘highly provocative acts’ against the State. For example, there were widespread protests in Kerala against the earlier move of Railways to form a new division headquartered at Salem by bifurcating the Palakkad division. Following this Mr. Prasad had promised that any further action on this would be taken only after he held talks with the Chief Ministers of Kerala and Tamil Nadu.

“But Mr. Velu has arbitrarily started transferring officials from Palakkad division as part of steps to constitute the Salem division. Similarly, Railways recently decided to wind up the office of the Chief Engineer (construction) in Thiruvananthapuram allegedly as per Mr. Velu’s wishes. However, the move was dropped after I informed him about the protest in Kerala against it.”

The Chief Minister said the all-party delegation would urge the Prime Minister and the Railway Minister to restrain Mr. Velu and other officials of Railways from launching arbitrary steps against Kerala.

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