The rail link to Kashmir is now ready to commence operations, said officials Wednesday, as the Commissioner of Railway Safety (CRS) greenlit the ambitious project’s final leg — the 17-km Katra-Reasi section.
The inspection by the CRS, the railway safety audit body under the Ministry of Civil Aviation, is the final check before train operations can begin.
“For the Katra-Reasi stretch of the Udhampur-Srinagar-Baramulla rail link, a detailed investigation was conducted, especially because of its topography and terrain, and authorisation was granted to the Northern Railway. There was no lacuna found in the project, the infrastructure is outstanding. Now, the entire link is getting connected and the dream of a train to Kashmir will come true soon,” said Dinesh Chand Deshwal, CRS, Northern Circle.
Due to security concerns, trains will run only during the day on this route, said a source.
Railway ministry officials said the CRS on Tuesday also approved a maximum speed of 85 km per hour for trains running between Shri Vaishno Devi Dham Katra and Reasi stations. “Apart from this, we have received fitness approval for a speed of 15 km per hour for the loop line of stations,” said an official. “The final CRS report has cleared the path to run a train between Jammu and Srinagar soon. Preparations are underway to run Vande Bharat, Diesel Electric Multiple Unit (DEMU) and Mainline Electric Multiple Unit (MEMU) trains from Jammu to Srinagar.”
DEMUs and MEMUs are self-propelled train rakes — that is, they have no separate locomotives — that run on short- and medium-distance routes in India.
The Kashmir line, or the Udhampur-Srinagar-Baramulla project, was sanctioned in 1994-95. The first three phases were completed by 2014. Trains have been running between Banihal and Baramulla in the Kashmir valley, and between Jammu, Udhampur and Katra in Jammu region. But the 111-km Katra-Banihal section was the most difficult to construct owing to the challenging terrain.
A 48-km section from Banihal to Sangaldan was commissioned in February 2024 and the 46-km Sangaldan-Reasi section received CRS authorisation on July 1. Katra to Reasi is the final leg that has been constructed, and has now received the CRS approval.
The Banihal-Katra section contains 97 km of tunnels and 7 km of bridges. “The toughest challenge in the project was to give foundation support to the world’s highest arch bridge (359 metres) on the Chenab River. It was achieved by a rock-bolting method using 30,000 tonnes of steel. The other main challenge was to build India’s first cable-stayed bridge on the Anji River. The two other bridges on the section are Reasi and Bakkal bridges.
The longest tunnel in this section of the Udhampur-Srinagar-Baramulla Rail Link project is 12.77 km long. Officials said cameras have been placed every 50 metres in tunnels to keep an eye on operational safety. The Railways has also built 215 km of roads in the region to access the project sites.
The first train that will run on the stretch will be an eight-coach Jammu-Kashmir Vande Bharat train, designed to operate in temperatures as low as -20°C.
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