Ernakulam Railway Goods (ERG) station-Old station: Railways now passes the buck to encroachers

Ernakulam Railway Goods (ERG) station -Old station: Railways now passes the buck to encroachers

Little is being done to restore train services to Old Railway Station (ORS) located behind the High Court, despite senior Railway officials confiding that basic infrastructure here can be readied in 45 days.

The Railway said that over two dozen encroachers would have to be evicted prior to resuming train services to the station. They would have to be rehabilitated either by the Kochi Corporation or by the State government.

Reacting to this, general convener of Old Railway Station Vikasana Samity K.P. Harihara Kumar said that the Corporation had agreed to rehabilitate the families. “The civic agency also set apart ample funds in its budget for commencing suburban train service,” he said.

Union Minister of State for Railways Manoj Sinha had assured the samity two months ago that the Railway would accord its nod if the Kochi Corporation or the State government pooled in with half the project cost of approximately Rs.15 crore. There is no need to revive all the tracks at the station, since the Railway wanted to resume services to the station by operating one or two trains here during peak times when the two main stations in the city are congested, Mr. Kumar said.

He added that the Railway is citing ‘flimsy reasons’ like encroachments to stonewall efforts to resume train services to the station that is in an abandoned condition. “The encroachers are concentrated in one end of the station, near the High Court, whereas a major portion of tracks and other utilities are on the northern side.” Setting at rest concerns of unavailability of diesel locomotive, Railway sources said that the Southern Railway is willing to give a diesel engine to operate short-distance trains to both ORS and HT, where the line has not been electrified.

The proposal on the station and Harbour Terminus (HT) located on Wellingdon Island was revived in June, prior to launching Ernakulam’s first intra-district MEMU service.

“The main work at ORS station (also known as Ernakulam Railway Goods (ERG) station) is to relay tracks and to install signals. Each of the two components can be completed in less than a month. A couple of rooms too will have to be built or existing ones renovated to house skeletal staff who would initially be posted here. All that is required is the formal sanction of Southern Railway head office,” officials said.

Source:The Hindu