New Delhi, December 04, 2008: The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) today approved the proposal of Manipur government to extend the broad gauge 27-km rail line from Tupul to Imphal so as to provide direct rail connectivity to the state capital with rest of the country.

The total length of the railway line from Jiribam to Imphal will be 125 km.

The CCEA approval in regard to Manipur's proposal was made during the Union Cabinet meeting chaired by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

It was a longstanding demand to connect Manipur's capital with the rest of the country through a railway line to end the transportation bottleneck.

On the request of the SPF Government led O.Ibobi Singh, the survey was again done so as to connect Imphal directly by railway line.

The alignment on this extended length from Tupul to Imphal had to negotiate a hill range having reduced level of approximately 1200 metre.

Construction of the railway line from Tupul to Imphal became feasible by raising the level of Tupul Station, providing 8.11 km long tunnel and changing the ruling gradient to 1 in 60 from Tupul to Imphal.

The proposed new broad gauge line will provide rail connectivity up to Imphal, besides enabling direct movement of freight and passengers.

The increased expenditure of the extension proposal is estimated to cost Rs 2,650 crores.

Since the project is a national project, 25 per cent funding will be from railway's gross budgetary support and 75 per cent from Finance Ministry as has already been approved for similar other national projects of North Eastern region.

Mention may be made that to provide rail connectivity to the State capital of Manipur; Jiribam- Tupul rail project was included in the budget 2004-05 at the cost of Rs.727.27 crore as a National Project.

The Prime Minister of India Dr Manmohan singh laid the foundation stone of the project at Jirbam on November 20, 2004. The line was proposed to terminate at Tupul, a small township about 53 km from Imphal by road as it was not considered feasible to construct the line beyond Tupul due to unfavorable altitudes and exceeding ruling gradients.

In the North Eastern Region, rail connectivity had been intensified recently after the Centre had taken up many rail projects as a National Project.

Recently Agartala, the State Capital of Tripura had been connected with the railway line with the rest of the country.

Tripura's State capital Agartala on October 5 this year became the second Northeastern capital town, after Guwahati, included in the railway map with regular train service beginning between the State and other parts of the country.

The survey for construction of the railway line from Dimapur to Kohima, the State capital of Nagaland is being taken up as a National Project with the process of laying of 125-km long railway line between Dimapur and Kohima began from November 25 this year.

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