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(BiharTimes)Early last month, a review meeting of railway board exposed grossly inadequate funding available for railway projects in Bihar. Acute shortage of funding has led to even curtailment of current year’s targets. Though zonal officials highlighted the shortages of fund for various projects, there has been no specific assurance from railway board on meeting these requirements. A comparison with Eastern Zone on the funding availability exposes railway to charges of political apathy. While most of the railway projects in Bihar are underfunded so much so that they are likely to miss the current year’s target, there has been no single such instance in case of West Bengal across any of the three railway zones covering it. Details given here under can be an eye opener for various stakeholders in the development of Bihar.

As can be seen from the above chart, as many as six out of 16 projects (as highlighted in yellow background) are facing the burnt of  inadequate funding. Three others have been affected by land acquisition problem (highlighted in light pink background). It is not that Bihar government is completely overboard. Mr. Nitish Kumar may go on expressing hope that Daniyawan-Barbigha route work is expedited by railways, but in claiming all this he seems to be oblivious of the actual facts.  Specifically, in case of Daniawan-Biharsharif Route, Government of Bihar is at fault as well.
 
In remaining seven cases, only two can be considered specific to Bihar as others are connected to North East regions connectivity requirement or with Jharkhand state. So what is it Minister of State for Railways Mr. Muniyappa is claiming?  When at fault, one should keep at least mum. However, it seems UPA II ministers are out to brazen it out. They should learn a bit of tact from Mr Nitish Kumar who realizing his own fault in these matters, is happy to explore possible co-existence with Ms. Mamata Banerjee rather than challenging her on these issues.
 
Further, railway seems to have put 14 projects of Bihar on the backburner in the name of public private partnership as given in the following chart. Only that, it is difficult to understand how private investors could be interested in these ‘Socially Desirable Projects’. Here again, not a single rail route from West Bengal has either been classified as socially desirable or put out for PPP mode.

From the above figures, it is apparent that Bihar’s heydays in relation to railway infrastructure is finally over. Ms. Mamata Banerjee is not only unconcerned about Bihar specific projects, but in fact has been vindictive to say the least. Moving out of OSD Khushi Ram from the proposed divisional HQ at Bhagalpur exemplifies the same attitude. Moreover, she seems to have completely forgotten about Dehri High Capacity Freight Bogie project or for that matter workshop projects at Garkha, Sonepur and Garhara. In any case, she does not claim to champion interest of any other state than West Bengal.  And yes, in all this, people’s representatives from Bihar are found to beconveniently napping. Given all these circumstances, it is no wonder that railway projects in Bihar are so hopelessly delayed.

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Mahesh Jha