Several railway projects could not be executed in Bengal because of the delay in land acquisition on the part of the state government, railway minister Ashwini Vaishnaw told the Rajya Sabha.

Vaishnaw, in a written reply in the Upper House on December 20, said the railways could not finish 43 projects — 13 new routes, four gauge conversions and 26 projects of laying additional tracks — because the state had not handed over the required land to the central utility.

“The minister has specifically pointed out that in Bengal, the railways need 3,040 hectares of land for these projects. However, the state has provided only 640 hectares so far and another 2,400 hectares are yet to be acquired,” said a senior railway official.

Altogether, ₹60,168 crore will be spent on those projects.

“Though fund allocation has increased manifold but pace of execution of a project is dependent on expeditious land acquisition. Railway acquires the land through state government and the completion of a railway project is dependent on land acquisition. Execution of important infrastructure projects falling fully/partly in the State of West Bengal are held up due to delay in land acquisition,” reads a release issued by the railway ministry while elaborating Vaishnaw’s reply.

A railway official said: “The 43 projects involve an additional railway network of around 4,479km. But because of the delay in land acquisition, only 1,655km of railway tracks had been commissioned till March this year.”

In his reply, the minister highlighted some of the pending projects.

He referred to the Nabadwipghat-Nabadwipdham new line (a distance of around 10km) in Nadia district, where the railways need around 107 hectares of land.

Similarly, 156.30 hectares are required to lay tracks on the 30km-long Balurghat-Hili route in South Dinajpur district. While 67.38 hectares were acquired, 88 hectares are yet to be taken over.

Officials in different districts said the process of land acquisition was in progress.

“For the Nabaddwipghat-Nabdwipdham project, initially there was some local resistance. But we have managed to sort it out and have sent a report to the railways, seeking funds for compensation,” said Pralay Raychaudhuri, the additional district magistrate (land and land reforms) of Nadia.

He said the state government was carrying out mutation or necessary changes in land records so that the plots could be handed over to railways for the Naihati–Ranaghat third line.

A senior state government official pointed out that the acquisition process had certain technical issues.

“The land has to be identified, the valuation of compensation has to be fixed and the railways will have to approve the amount. In some cases, the railways carry out the valuation on their own, which also takes time. On our part, we always work in coordination with the railways,” he said.

Haaris Rasheed, additional district magistrate (land and land reforms), South Dinajpur, said land for a stretch of the Balurghat-Hili line had been handed the land to the railways. "The remaining plots will be acquired by January next year,” added Rasheed.

Additional reporting by SubhasishChaudhuri in Calcutta and our Raiganj correspondent