Fed-up with crowding, locals want Indian Railways to roll-out relief

Tired of the heavy crowding inside trains, especially on the Thane-Kalyan belt, the locals and passenger associations are complaining about it to the rail authorities and want the railways and its planning agencies to expedite the construction of new rail corridors under the Mumbai Urban Transport Project (MUTP)-3.

The Mumbai Rail Vikas Corporation (MRVC), that is implementing the MUTP-3, has stated that it needs 100 to 110 hectares of land for the new rail lines. This land is mainly for the Kalwa-Airoli elevated corridor, quadrupling of the Virar-Dahanu rail lines and a new suburban rail on the Panvel-Karjat section.

“We have identified the land required for these projects. The demolition of illegal structures shall begin after the monsoon,” said R Khurana, Chairman and Managing Director, MRVC.

All the three rail lines are important as they connect the hinterland to the far suburbs of Mumbai. “The Kalwa-Airoli elevated rail line is important but work on it has not started. Several people have lost their lives on the Kalwa-Mumbra rail line and this delay in the project will result in more accidents,” said S Desai, a resident of Kalwa who has been tweeting to the rail ministry for long now.

The rail officials claim that the bigger problem is the illegal settlements. Sources said that there are over 2,000 illegal structures which need to be demolished. “A majority of them occupy the land needed for the Kalwa-Airoli elevated rail line,” said a rail official. A new station called Dighe between these two stations has also been proposed. This line will connect the Main and Trans Harbour lines. Two more tracks will be added on the Virar-Dahanu section which will allow for the segregation of local trains from the long-distance ones.

By Shashank Rao, DNA India