Dhumal offers to acquire land for Leh rail project

Shimla, August 12 : After the in-principle approval of the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) to the Himachal Pradesh proposal on the railway line to Leh via Manali and 13,051-foot-high Rohtang Pass, Chief Minister Prem Kumar Dhumal on Tuesday offered to the Centre to undertake the entire land acquisition and rehabilitation process along 400-km Himachal stretch and get a pre-feasibility report on the project prepared by November 30.

“I really thank Prime Minister Manmohan Singh for accepting my proposal. Himachal will extend all possible help in building the railway line, which has already assumed a strategic importance,” he told The Indian Express. “It’s heartening to learn about setting up of a high-powered China Study Group, which has been asked by the PMO to provide its assessment of the project by the month-end.”

A private investor, ICC holding, on Monday had offered Dhumal to do a feasibility study and also prepare a detailed project report (DPR) for the project, starting in March 2009.

Dhumal has decided to convene a meeting of top Government officials and invite Rakesh Saran Mathur, the CEO of ICC holding, for working out modalities of the pre-feasibility study. “We have got a letter from Mathur asking for the meeting and setting up a nodal agency for the project,” confirmed the Chief Minister’s Office (CMO) here.

In the letter, Mathur claimed the DPR would be completed in 18 months and the project in six years. The process for obtaining necessary clearances could start once the Himachal Pradesh and J&K governments signed an MoU with the company. “We reiterate that the entire investment will be brought in by us and the controlling stake in the entire assets will revert to the nation after the end of the concession period as per agreements to be signed,” the CEO informed the CMO.

Dhumal, who had written a letter to the PM in February and later submitted his proposal to President Pratibha Patil during her visit to Shimla this May, had said the Chinese move of extending its rail line right up to Lhasa and western Tibet had raised security concerns. “The project to convert the Pathankot-Jogindernagar rail line into a broad gauge may be examined so that India can effectively counter the logistical superiority that China has gained by extending its rail line into western Tibet,” the CM wrote.

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