AGARTALA, June 9 (TIWN): The long awaited dream of Broad-gauge conversion work goes in full swing at various railway tracks of Agartala. After the successful BG (broad gauge) trial run of a diesel engine from Lumding to Silchar the Northeast Frontier Railway (NFR) is working hard at much more faster pace to bring Agartala under the country’s Broad Gauge Network by March 2016.

The successful run of the trains on the broad-gauge track will bring sync with those in the rest of the country and Tripura is gearing up for faster connectivity and communication with several parts of the nation.

These trains will have five compartments and would be able to carry about 500-700 passengers per fleet both ways and this will also reduce passenger pressure on NH-44, said highly placed official. 

Although the engineers had to contend with difficult hilly terrain, geologically unstable hills and difficult law and order challenges but the enthusiasm and the progress of work in laying the railway track shows that the story of meter-gauge railway track will be a history soon and Tripura will be very soon gifted with the reward of broad-gauge network. 

After a meeting between the Ministry of Railway Board Executive Director Vivek Kumar along with his 12 members’ railway team and State Minister for Revenue Badal Chowdhury it seems that the days are not so far when Tripura will also be connected with other metropolitan cities like Kolkata, Delhi and Mumbai directly by train with the initiatives of Northeast Frontier Railway (NFR) working hard to bring Agartala under the map of country’s Broad Gauge network very soon.

Sources said that, “The BG line construction work from Agartala to Udaipur would be completed by March 2016, whereas the rail line work up to Sabroom would be completed by March 2018.”

However, the railway authority is equally working hard to build cross bridges over the rail line at every platform of the rail stations to ensure free movement of the passengers.

However, with the introduction of the BG facility, one could return from Guwahati to Agartala, capital town of the landlocked State –Tripura in a journey spanning around eight hours and if things fall in place, the ongoing work of BG conversion work from Lumding to Agartala via Badarpur would be completed shortly.

With the everyday progress in the conversion work, the common mass of the state is observing a ray of hope for faster communication and transportation.