A high-level meeting took place to discuss the land requirement and acquisition in Burdwan West District for the much hyped Ludhiana–Dankuni Eastern Dedicated Freight Corridor (DFC) Project of Indian Railways (IR) at Asansol yesterday.
Additional District Magistrate (ADM), Land Acquisition of Burdwan West District, Khursid Ali Qadri, presided over the meeting in which besides top state officials, senior officials of the DFC were also present.
It has been learnt that the railways needs to acquire about 438 acres of land to set up the Dedicated Freight Corridor (DFC), in Burdwan West District. The DFC, from Ludhiana in Punjab to Dankuni in Hooghly of West Bengal, will be passing through Paschim Burdwan District.
Already, the railways has acquired about fifty per cent of the total land requirement in the district and is in process to acquire the remaining 50 per cent of the land required. Mr. Khursid Ali Qadri said that besides the Dedicated Freight Corridor, new double lines will also be laid between Kalipahari to Damodar Station of South Eastern Railway (SER).
That project will also require acquisition of land. Miss Mamata Banerjee, who was then the railway minister has in 2010 announced the 1839 kilometre Ludhiana-to-Dankuni Eastern Dedicated railway Freight Corridor project.
Once this mega project is completed, freight trains will run exclusively along this corridor, leaving more space to the existing passenger train lines, thereby opening up scope to run faster passenger trains.
Gas Authority of India Limited (GAIL will also lay gas pipelines in 11 mouzas of Burdwan West District. The pipeline laying work over a 1500-kilometre stretch, will cost Rs.6,000 crores. In the meeting it has been decided that the land acquisition work should be done faster so that the projects meet their respective deadlines.