Indian Railways to unveil over 200 new lines soon

Good news for all rail travellers as Indian Railways will very soon unveil and introduce more than 200 lines all across the country. At present, the lines are in different phases of execution. The information related to number of lines and the states in which there will be an addition is been provided by the State Railways Minister, Rajen Gohain in written to a query that had been asked on Thursday in Lok Sabha. It has been depicted that in order for the implementation and execution of these Railway projects, they will require some clearances from few departments of Central Ministries and State Government related to shifting of utilities, land acquisition, statutory clearance in wildlife, forestry and more. The decision of unveiling new lines was already announced earlier in this year on February 1. As per the list, the on-going project of Railways, the new lines were going to introduce in the following states.

Assam & North Eastern Region: 15
Andhra Pradesh: 18
Bihar: 34
Chhattisgarh: 8
Delhi: 1
Gujarat: 4
Haryana: 7
Himachal Pradesh: 4
Jammu & Kashmir: 1
Jharkhand: 14
Karnataka: 16
Kerala: 2
Madhya Pradesh: 8
Maharashtra: 12
Odisha: 10
Punjab: 6
Rajasthan: 10
Telangana: 9
Tamil Nadu: 8
Uttar Pradesh: 15
Uttarakhand: 3
West Bengal: 18

In the meanwhile, the main overhead equipment cables that are used to power the trains have become a prime source of concern for both Western and Central Railways. As an integral part of inspections of ROBs- Road Over Bridges crossing the rail lines, it has been seen that these cables are actually linked with the bridges that could be risky in the long run. It had been detected out by the Indian Railways engineers and IIT, Bombay engineers who have been allocated this task of inspection of 445 bridges all across Mumbai and metropolitan area. As stated by a Railway official on the condition based on anonymity, the cables hang from bottom of ROBs. It has been found in some bridges that cables are been associated up to the cantilever. In the coming days, we are going to shift the cables onto the main girder. These cantilevers are not in direct contact with the main bridge, such as the one in Andheri and are likely to collapse. The OHE cables as well as their respective paraphernalia weigh minimum about 500 kgs and just in case, it snaps than it would put more weight on the same and it will hang.