Katra-Banihal track laying works – a Case Study of ineptitude, cost overruns and corruption

Katra-Banihal track laying works – a Case Study of ineptitude, cost overruns and corruption

Katra: There was supposed to be a railway line between Katra and Banihal, a part of the Kashmir link project flagged off by Atal Bihari Vajpayee in 2002 with a five-year deadline for completion. For a leader who had been elected on the platform of good governance, Modi did not deem it fit to explain why, even 12 years later, railway passengers still have to put up with so much trouble to go to Kashmir.

The omission is curious as the proposed Katra-Banihal track, which is now due to be completed by 2018, is a case study of ineptitude, cost overruns and corruption. This is clearly the most challenging stretch of the Kashmir link project.

Katra and Banihal are separated by seven ridges of the geologically young Himalayas, which are notoriously prone to landslides and earthquakes. Hence the alignment in this stretch required the most meticulous planning, of the three broad sections of the Kashmir railway link project.

The northern section, which had been sanctioned in 1999, was completed in 2009. Stretching over 119 km, the northern section was the easiest portion as it was built on the flat terrain of the Kashmir valley, from Qazigund to Baramulla. The southern section, which has recently been inaugurated by Modi, was relatively harder as it had been built on the foothills of the Himalayas, from Udhampur to Katra.

Though it is not more than 25 km, the railways took 19 years to complete this section, which was sanctioned way back in 1995.

The middle section, connecting Katra with Qazigund, is the one that actually provides the railway link to the Kashmir valley. Though sanctioned in 2002, the section stretching across 144 km remains incomplete. The only part that has been completed so far is the 18-km stretch from Banihal to Qazigund, including a 11-km tunnel cutting through the eighth and last ridge of the Himalayas. The alignment approved by the railways could be executed in this part as it crossed the Pir Panjal ridge through a straight tunnel.

But when it came to the seven ridges lying between Katra and Banihal, the alignment approved by the railways was far different: the track was planned to be built on bridges and tunnels skirting the mountain slopes. Besides being harder to build, the alignment has proved to be unstable as it is vulnerable to the vagaries of nature. Adding to the complexity of this alignment was the ambitious plan to build mega arch bridges at high altitudes to cross rivers Anji and Chenab.  Some of the tunnels on the Katra-Banihal stretch have already collapsed.

Little wonder then that when the original deadline of 2007 expired, barely 10% of the Katra-Banihal stretch had been executed and some of the tunnels in that part had already collapsed. The churning within the railways led to the proposal of an alternative alignment marked by straight tunnels, the kind that has been built between Banihal and Qazigund.  Having done away with the slope-skirting alignment, the alternative proposal reduced the length of the track between Katra and Banihal from 126 km to 67 km.

In an embarrassing admission of the need to review the approved alignment, all work in the Katra-Banihal stretch was suspended in July 2008. A month later, the railway board appointed an expert committee to evaluate the alternative alignment. In June 2009, the panel recommended that 93 km out of the approved alignment of 126 km between Katra and Banihal be abandoned. It also raised questions about the safety of the Anji and Chenab bridges. The railway board accepted the report and, by August 2012, it scrapped the Anji bridge.

For its half-hearted attempts to take corrective action, the railway board has been repeatedly censured by the Delhi high court, CAG and CVC. In 2010, the high court held that the review had actually been “scuttled” by two board members who had been proponents of the flawed alignment. In 2011, the CVC advised the board to fix responsibility on the officers responsible for “project mismanagement”.

The following year, the CAG estimated that the losses incurred due to “construction failures” in the project were to the tune of Rs 3,258 crore. Finally, about a month ago, the high court directed the board to set up another expert committee as the previous one had failed to consider the alternative alignment.

Despite such signals, Modi seems to have missed the point that the railways have executed the easier parts of the Kashmir link project while the tougher stretch has remained unresolved.

Source: RailNews