Bengaluru Suburban Railway Project to finish by December 2027: Minister M B Patil
Bengaluru: The Minister was speaking to reporters here at the signing of the MoU between the Karnataka government and the KfW Development Bank of Germany for funding the BSRP project. The bank will lend ₹4,561 crore at an annual interest rate of four per cent interest for 20 years.
N Manjula, Managing Director of K-RIDE (Rail Infrastructure Development Company-Karnataka), which is the nodal agency to complete the project, and Wolf Muth, Country Director, KFW Development Bank signed and exchanged the documents in the presence of Patil, who holds the infrastructure development portfolio.
This is the supplementary agreement between Germany's KfW Development Bank and K-RIDE followed by the primary agreement on December 15, 2023 between the Department of Economic Affairs of the Government of India and KfW for the disbursal of ₹4,561 Crore.
"We intend to complete all the four corridors by December 2027," the Minister said.
According to him, the funding is for Corridor-1 from Bengaluru City Railway Station to Devanahalli and Corridor-3 from Kengeri to Whitefield.
"We have not yet started Corridor-1 and Corridor-3 for want of funds. Now that we have got funds we will take up the project," the minister explained.
Phase one of Corridor-2 from Chikkabanavara to Yeshwantpur will be completed by June 2025 and phase two from Yeshwantpur to Benniganahalli will be finished by June 2026. From Benniganahalli to Rajanukunte stretch under Corridor-4 will be completed in December 2026, Patil said.
Corridor-1 has been split into two parts. The first part from Yelahanka to Devanahalli will be finished by December 2026 while Bengaluru City to Yelahanka will be completed by December 2027.
The Minister also underlined that the BSRP will not compete with the Metro Rail project but complement it. He also promised to resolve the land acquisition issue pertaining to the Corridor-1 and Corridor-3.
Manjula said, "The project has been planned like the Metro. It has been designed to have a train service every 90 seconds. The operational issues will be decided on the passenger footfall."
The time limit of December 2027 is contradictory to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s 40-month deadline to finish the Bengaluru Suburban Rail Project, which pegged the completion date as December 2025.
While laying the foundation stone of BSRP in Bengaluru in June 2022, the Prime Minister had said that "what had not happened in the past 40 years will be completed in the next 40 months".
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Among developing states, TN leads with growth of 11.19 per cent, no thanks to BJP: Udhayanidhi
Thanjavur/Pudukottai (PTI): Tamil Nadu currently stands as the number one state among India’s developing regions, boasting a significant growth rate of 11.19 per cent, despite a stark lack of support from the BJP-led union government, Deputy Chief Minister Udhyanidhi Stalin said on Sunday.
"The central administration has failed to provide requested projects or the funds rightfully due to the state. This neglect reached a peak in the last Union Budget, where the name "Tamil Nadu" was entirely absent, with no new projects allocated to the region," Udhayanidhi told the gathered crowd at Peravurani in Thanjavur.
He also accused the central government of "attempting to undermine" the state's cultural identity by re-imposing a 'Three-Language Policy' and pushing Hindi and Sanskrit into the territory.
"While these threats loom, the opposition leader, Edappadi Palaniswami, remains silent. Instead of questioning these injustices, he has formed an alliance with the BJP, effectively facilitating the entry of these policies into Tamil Nadu," the Deputy Chief Minister added.
According to him, the upcoming assembly election presents a critical opportunity for the people to respond to this continuous neglect.
"It is time for the voters to decide whether to support the Tamil Nadu team or a Delhi team that ignores the state’s developmental needs and linguistic heritage," he added.
Earlier, speaking at Viralimalai in Pudukottai, he argued that this election "is a war between the Delhi Team and the Tamil Nadu Team".
"We are the Tamil Nadu Team...we must send Delhi Team back to where they came from with a decisive win," he said.
He urged the electorate to break the "remote control" Delhi uses to try and control Tamil Nadu.
Udhayanidhi attacked the opposition, specifically targeting incumbent MLA and AIADMK candidate C Vijayabaskar by calling him a "drama company actor", who is part of a "slave group" being threatened by the CBI and ED.
The deputy CM listed the infrastructure and welfare achievements of the "Dravidian Model" government, specifically mentioning quality road works worth Rs 25 crore for 30 km and drinking water connections worth Rs 17 crore in the region.
He also claimed that the DMK revived the laptop scheme for college students after the AIADMK abandoned it in 2019.
Looking toward a second term, he promised that the government would increase the women's entitlement amount to Rs 2,000 and build Rs 10 lakh houses under the 'Kalaignar Kanavu Illam' initiative for those without homes.
Invoking his political lineage, he told the local cadre to set a high target, noting that while the party lost the seat by a narrow margin previously, this time DMK must win by a margin of "50,000 votes to drive away the slave group".
