Telapur-Ramachandrapuram section will be commissioned by December 2017, says SCR General Manager

The 5.75-km-long Telapur-Ramachandrapuram section of the Multi-Modal Transit System Phase II works would be completed and the line would be commissioned by December 2017, according to General Manager, South Central Railway, Vinod Kumar Yadav.

Announcing this to media persons during his first inspection of MMTS works after assuming charge on January 10, he said that between December’17 and December’18, the entire phase II comprising 75 km to 80 km in four corridors would be commissioned.

As the physical works were being completed, the process for getting statutory compliance from the concerned agencies including the Commissioner for Railway Safety would also be set in motion, he said. Once the physical works are completed, it was just a matter of a few months for the track to be thrown open for traffic, he pointed out. Mr. Yadav said a key issue pertaining to acquisition of Defence land was being sorted out at the level of the Defence Ministry and that a major chunk of land required had been acquired. Another issue, he said, involved connectivity to the Shamshabad airport and this was being taken up with the Civil Aviation Ministry.

The ₹ 817 crore MMTS phase II project involves quadrupling of the Moula Ali-Ghatkesar section and doubling of Falaknuma-Umdanagar Shamshabad, Bolarum-Medchal, Sanathnagar-Moula Ali, Moula Ali-Malkajgiri-Sitafalmandi and the Telapur-Ramachandrapuram sections. Electrification works are being taken up on all of these. Accompanied by Divisional Railway Manager-Secunderabad Ashesh Agarwal and Chief Project Manager, Rail Vikas Nigam Limited, P. Srinivas, he went on an inspection of works on the Secunderabad-Moula Ali-Cherlapalli-Ghatkesar section on Tuesday.

Getting down at three locations on the said sections, he had a close look at the works that primarily involved laying of track over an initial bed of granite, linking them up and filling up the gaps between the bed and track and between the cement concrete sleepers with ballast. He also had first-hand experience with the track-laying machine. About the financials, Mr. Yadav said while the Railways had spent about ₹ 160 crore on the project so far, the Telangana government had chipped in with ₹ 60 crore out of the two-thirds sharing component. “We are expecting a release this year of ₹ 160 crore from the State. We anticipate no problems and work will not be affected,” he assured.

Mr. Srinivas said works on this project were among the fastest compared to other ongoing projects. “We started in 2013 and by now we have linked 70 to 80 per cent of the tracks. Phase II is an extension of Phase I but it has track-laying components that were not there in the earlier phase,” he pointed out.