Kerala eats bitter pill in budgets
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While all eyes are now on the Railway Budget, to be announced on Wednesday, many promises made to the state in successive budgets earlier are yet to see light of day.
Hoping that announcements for Kerala in this Railway Budget do not wind up like empty promises again, Member of Parliament A. Sampath told this newspaper that the wagon factory at Cherthala, sanctioned in 2007-08 Railway Budget still remains on paper, though the Autocast had announced willingness to hand over land in their custody.
He said the Thiruvanan-thapuram-Chennai Duranto Express also remained a nonstarter, as is the case with the MEMU service announced between Ernakulam and Kollam.
Mr Sajeev Parisavila, president, Southern Railway Passengers Asso-ciation, said the MEMU service was announced in the 2009 rail budget. He said the railways had even made trial runs but nothing concrete has shown up.
The last rail budget even announced the new MEMU service and the railway timetable lists the train’s schedule but there is no MEMU on track even as the new Railway Budget is hours away, he added.
Mr Sampath said the railway medical college proposed for Thiruvanantha-puram is another project that has not turned into reality. He said the railways have 60 acres of land in Kadakavur and 30 acres in Nemom, and could have selected either locations for the project if they were 'sincere'.
The proposal to upgrade the four major railway stations in the state, including Thiruvananthapuram, into world-class stations also lies in the cold storage, he pointed out.
Similar is the case with the bottling plant project announced for Thiruvananthapuram in the last budget. The announcement to set up coaching depots at Kottayam and Nemom is also still to take off, Mr Sampath said.
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