AGARTALA, April 7 (TIWN): NFR officials met Tripura Transport Minister Manik Dey on Friday at his chamber.

Reportedly, various demo train journeys to take place in next few months and the meeting also discussed on that part.

A source said that the issue of Rajdhani Express train launching was also discussed there.

It's worthy to mention here that Trains first reached Tripura in 1964 when the railway was extended to the state's northern business hub, Dharmanagar. Later it was extended further to Kumarghat. The northeastern state capital came on India's railmap with the advent of the railways in the subcontinent in 1853. The foundation stone of the 119 km Kumarghat-Agartala railway project was laid in 1996 by the former Prime Minister H D Deve Gowda and during the laying of rail lines, provisions were kept for swiftly converting it to broad gauge. 40 years time was taken by the Government since then to connect Agartala by rail.

The NFR had spent Rs 900 crore ($190 million) to connect Agartala by rail by making three tunnels through the Longtharai Valley, Baramura and Atharamura Hills in Dhalai and West Tripura districts. The 1,962-metre Longtharai tunnel is the longest railway tunnel in eastern India.^[5] The architecture of the station resembles Ujjayanta Palace.

Now the state has 4 Express trains and seamless railway network upto Udaipur.