New life for junked railway corridor

City railway officials are all set to pitch for the scrapped Panvel-Diva-Vasai-Virar suburban corridor in Railway Budget 2016-17 to be announced in February. The project had been taken off the list after the state government raised objection and asked the railway to prioritise other projects. Every year, the Railway Budget is announced on February 26. The ministry wanted to include the Panvel-Diva-Vasai-Virar project in last year’s budget but the state government intervened. The state then expressed that quadrupling of railway tracks between Virar and Dahanu and doubling of lines between Panvel and Karjat should be included instead.

The Panvel-Diva-Vasai-Virar suburban corridor was estimated to cost around '10 crore and railway officials in the city have revisited the project since, with a detailed estimate of the works readied. “The detailed work estimate has been made. Now, with that as reference, we will be able to ascertain the final cost of the project. We are planning to get this estimate ready for submission to the minister within the next 10 days,” said an official, requesting anonymity.

Officials said that politicians at the time were not letting the Railways plan according to the need of the hour. “We needed the extra line between Panvel-Diva-Vasai-Virar since the pattern of commuters emerging on this route in the past 10 years has been strongly consistent. However, politicians asked us to push the Virar-Dahanu and Panvel-Karjat projects instead,” added the official.

Officials said that this corridor might not be included as part of the Mumbai Urban Transport Project (MUTP). “It is true that we will be sending the Panvel-Diva-Vasai-Virar to be included in the railway budget, but it will be submitted as a separate work altogether and will not be mentioned as one of the works under the MUTP. Anyway, MUTP III is yet to be sanctioned and there are no signs of what IV will have,” said another official.

Union railway minister Suresh Prabhu had declared the sanction of MUTP III but procedures for actual sanction are yet to be carried out.