New condition for Sabarimala railway; Kerala asked to bear entire cost of land acquisition; letter issued

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The Railways has asked the Kerala government to acquire all the land required for the Sabarimala railway line, which has been Kerala's demand for three decades, at the state's expense. The Railways has written to the Kerala government demanding this. In the past, the Railways had paid money in advance to acquire the land required for the projects. In the case of the Sabari line, the stand is opposite. The Kerala government will have to spend Rs 1140 crore for land acquisition at the beginning of the project itself.

204 hectares of land are to be acquired in Kottayam, Idukki and Ernakulam districts. This is 30% of the total project cost (3800.93 crores). The earlier proposal was that the state should pay half of the total project cost (1900.47 crores) in instalments. There was no mention of land acquisition cost. The new proposal is that the state should bear the entire land acquisition cost and 20% of the construction cost.

Kerala's stance is that if half the cost is paid from KIIFB, it should be exempted from the state's borrowing limit. The Centre rejected this demand. The Railways reiterated that a tripartite agreement should be signed by the Railways, the State, and the Reserve Bank to share the cost. It was assured that the Sabarimala highway would be made a reality in a meeting held last week with Union Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw led by Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan. The Railways' new proposal follows this.

Railway team to arrive next month

A high-level team of the Railways will arrive in Kerala next month to inspect the land acquisition process. Out of the required 152 hectares, 24.4 hectares have already been acquired in Ernakulam. It was decided in a meeting called by Minister V Abdurahiman yesterday to reopen the land acquisition units in the districts where the Sabarimala line passes and to redeploy employees. Meanwhile, there is no agreement on the cost.

Railways can take over

• Along with the Sabari route, the Railways is also constructing the Guruvayur-Thirunavaya route, which was frozen in 2019. The Railways has not yet asked the state to bear half of the cost of this

• Even if there is no state share, the project can be implemented entirely at the central cost. It was recently decided to build 55 overbridges at the railways' own cost as the state did not provide the share.

• The Sabari route is 111 km long. Of this, 7 km of rail and one bridge have been frozen after construction