KARIMGANJ / AGARTALA, April 19 (TIWN): Tripura’s PWD Dept already shown their lackluster attitude in last 2 years to maintain NH-44 after taken over maintenance from Central Govt. People are anticipating that BG Passenger train service will start from 7th May 2016 between SILCHAR-AGARTALA. The long wait of northeastern state of Tripura would like to have direct broad-gauge rail connectivity with rest of India soon. Karimgang,Dharmanagar & Agartala found place in the railway map of India in the year 2016 .A daily express train ran between Lumding and Agartala. Since October last year, metre-gauge train services between Lumding and Karimganj stations (distance 203 km) were stopped for undertaking ‘Mega Block’ of Lumding-Badarpur-Silchar section. The Lumding-Agartala express train too stopped its operations and a passenger train plied between Karimganj and Agartala till its services too were withdrawn for broad conversion of Badarpur-Karimganj-Agartala section. The passenger train services are yet to resume on the newly converted track.Northeast Frontier Railway (NFR) sources said the pace of conversion work on Badarpur-Agartala section would be faster than the Lumding-Badarpur-Silchar section as the metre-gauge tracks between Kumarghat and Agartala (distance 107 km) were laid keeping in mind the need of future conversion project.

Inordinate delays in completion of gauge conversion work on Lumding-Badarpur section, which falls in Assam, had delayed the realisation of having direct broad-gauge rail connectivity for Tripura for long.

“The distinct advantage of having a broad gauge rail destination at Agartala would be that it will not only serve as a railway junction for further expansion of network in the region but would, in the later stages, also help in supplementing the rail connection with neighboring countries, particularly Bangladesh. In addition to improving the transport infrastructure in the region, this would also be an adjuvant to India’s “Act East” policy,”

The Indian railways is also in the process of laying a 15 km long rail track to connect Agartala with Akhaura in Bangladesh. This is with the objective to provide an alternative rail route for Northeast India to Kolkata via Bangladesh.