AGARTALA, August 3 (TIWN): Northeast Frontier Railway (NFR) has prepared the master plan to establish sustainable railway connectivity between north-eastern states and South-Asian countries except Indonesia. According to NFR officials, Indian railway has already begun survey work of proposed trans-Asian railway project covering Tripura, Mizoram, Manipur, Nagaland and Arunachal Pradesh via Myanmar. A top official of NFR said as per the plan sanctioned by Indian Railway, 252 kilometres railway track would be laid between Dhalai district headquarter Jawharnagar to Darlong city of Myanmar though Kolashib town of Mizoram.

“Initially, survey work for 109 kilometres railway line between Jawharnagar and Kolashib has started and 148 kilometres distance from Kolashib to Darlong to be surveyed in next phase. And if everything goes on order, track-laying for south-Asian railway link to begin by next few years,” he pointed out.

Similarly, survey work of 98 kilometres distance from Jiribam to More to Tanu of Myanmar via Imphal is expected to be completed by next March, Singh stated adding that survey work for connecting Aizawl and up to Myanmar from Sairang covering 226 kilometres has already been started. As part of trans-Asian railway network, railway authority has already sanctioned survey work for setting up a link between Belonia, southern town of Tripura and Chittagong town of southern Bangladesh.

Two more short distance roads are proposed to be considered after survey report to connect Panisagar, Northern town of Tripura to Simanapur of Western Mizoram covering 80 kilometres distance and Patharkandhi, south Assam to Kanmun of Mizoram covering 45 kilometres of distance, he added.

NFR is all set to issue work order to Ircon International Ltd to lay the railway tracks for linking Agartala with Akhaura of Bangladesh, as per the bilateral agreements during last visit of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh to Dhaka, NFR officials reiterated.

He however, blamed insufficient flow of fund for expansion and development of railway tracks in North-eastern states especially gauges conversion between Lumding and Agartala and expansion of railway from Agartala to Sabroom. Justifying the blame, they said NFR had sought Rs 135 crore for BG conversion work from Silchar to Agartala but the Centre has allocated only Rs 5 crore.