New rail line project work crawls due to land issues

RUNNING several years behind schedule, the Talcher-Bimlagarh new rail line project continues to drag on due to delay in acquisition of private land and alienation of government land in patches in Angul, Deogarh and Sundargarh districts.

- EXPRESS NEWS SERVICE @ Rourkela

Reliable sources said transfer of required land for the project has progressed significantly over the past couple of years. However, acquisition of land in patches are causing bottlenecks in completion of the project.

Seeking to know the status of the project, the Sachetan Nagarik Manch had filed a petition in the Jana Sunani portal of the Odisha government. In reply, the chief administrative officer of the construction organisation of East Coast Railway (ECoR) said one of the reasons behind the delay was the pending cases in the Land Acquisition, Rehabilitation and Resettlement court, Sambalpur.