Parul Chandra
New Delhi, July 3: It rained goodies for West Bengal on Friday. Railway minister and Trinamul Congress chief Mamata Banerjee, who makes no secret of her determination to wrest power from the ruling Left Front in her home state in the 2011 Assembly elections, sprinkled her entire Railway Budget speech in the Lok Sabha with references to her party motto of "Maa, maati, manush" as she announced a slew of measures for West Bengal. From new trains to new rail lines, world-class railway stations and new "nonstop" services, the state got it all.
Indeed, of the 53 new rail lines the minister announced, 22 are in Ms Banerjee’s state. Similarly, of the 57 new trains that she announced, 14 benefit West Bengal. Of the 12 new nonstop "Duronto" trains announced by the minister, four will run between West Bengal and another state: Howrah-Mumbai, Howrah-New Delhi, Sealdah-New Delhi and Kolkata-Amritsar.
Ms Banerjee also said the railways would take over the wagon units of Burn Standard and Braithwaite, both in West Bengal, which are now under the ministry of heavy industry.
In yet another significant announcement, the minister said a new rail coach factory with state-of-the art facilities will be set up in the Kanchrapara-Halisahar railway complex in West Bengal. With 500 coaches to be manufactured here annually, this will help generate employment in this area and thus politically benefit the Trinamul Congress.
West Bengal’s newly-found privileged status vis-a-vis the railways is nowhere more evident than in the list of 375 stations which would be developed as "adarsh" (exemplary) stations. A substantial chunk of these are in West Bengal — including Asansol, Ballygunge, Bankura, Barrackpore, Belur Math, Budge Budge, Burrabazar, Chittaranjan, Diamond Harbour, Dum Dum Junction, Eden Gardens, Farakka, Hooghly, Murshidabad, Panskura, Siliguri Junction, Tollygunge and Uluberia. Many of these are in and around the Kolkata area.
The many new trains she announced for West Bengal include the New Jalpaiguri-Sealdah Superfast, Howrah-Bengaluru Superfast, Alipurduar-New Jalpaiguri Express Inter-City, Kolkata-Rampurhat Express, New Jalpaiguri-Digha Express, Purulia-Howrah Express and Kolkata-Bikaner Express.
Some of the trains under the extended category where West Bengal is concerned are the Sealdah-New Delhi to Amritsar, Ranchi-Alipurduar to Guwahati and Kolkata-Murshidabad Hazarduari Express to Lalgola.
Troubled areas such as Singur and Nandigram were not forgotten by the minister, nor Maoist-infested Lalgarh, which has been a flashpoint between the ruling CPI(M) and the Trinamul Congress in recent weeks. A new Singur-Nandigram rail line was among those announced by the minister on Friday.
A new rail line has been proposed for Lalgarh too — the Salboni-Jhargram line via Lalgarh, Belpahari. Besides this, West Bengal gets a 1,000 MW power plant in Adra, on the state’s border with Jharkhand. This too is located close to Lalgarh, Ms Banerjee noted. "This project is of great importance as it will be located in an underdeveloped tribal area and help provide employment, bringing tribal people into the mainstream," she said.
On the railways’ dedicated freight corridor project, Ms Banerjee said the government had approved extension of the Eastern Corridor upto Dankuni in West Bengal. There was a bounty for Howrah Station too, with the minister announcing that its decongestion would be undertaken by shifting suburban services from there to Saltgola.
In yet another move to woo her home state, Ms Banerjee proposed the takeover of Basumati Sahitya Mandir, a state public sector unit which has not been functional for over two years. "I will be happy to take over this institution if the state government hands it over to the railways," the minister said.
Dhanekhali, the town which weaves the Dhanekhali saris favoured by Ms Banerjee, is one of three towns selected by the railways to help local craftspeople move their products to consumption centres. This, Ms Banerjee said, would help artisans to access new markets. The minister also referred to a proposal to set up a nursing college on railway land in Kolkata.
