When Prime Minister Narendra Modi flags off a metro train between Howrah Maidan and Esplanade in Calcutta on Wednesday, it will open India's first under-river tunnel, fulfilling a dream which the city dwellers saw almost 53 years ago.
Out of the total 4.8-km long tunnel between the two stations - Howrah Maidan and Esplanade - 1.2-km distance is 30 metres below the Hooghly river, making it "the country's first transportation tunnel under any mighty river".
Not only that, the Howrah metro station will also be the deepest in the country.
The tunnel is a part of the East-West Metro Corridor project which starts from Sector V and ends at Sealdah at present. It will be extended to Howrah Maidan covering a total distance of 16.6 km out of which 10.8 km is underground.
According to Metro Railway, this corridor was identified in the city's master plan in 1971. The experience of India's first metro in Calcutta and the success of the Delhi metro network provided enough technical support and showed the way to the planners to sanction it in July 2008.
"That's how the fascinating journey of building the East-West corridor began. This line connects Howrah and Sealdah railway stations, two of the busiest stations in the world, and passes through under Hooghly river, the first such river crossing in the country," Kausik Mitra, Chief Public Relation Officer, Metro Railways, said.
He further said Howrah and Calcutta are two centuries old historical cities of West Bengal and this tunnel will connect these two cities under the river Hooghly.
The Indian Railways under which the Metro Railways functions, states that 4.8-km long stretch of East-West Metro from Howrah Maidan to Esplanade, built at a cost of Rs 4,138 crore, will have the deepest metro station in India at Howrah.
"This stretch will boost up the mass transport scenario of the region by providing a fast train connectivity. It will also solve the perennial traffic congestion and improve air quality by reducing carbon footprint," Mitra said.
"People coming from distant places of Hooghly, Midnapore and Howrah as well as other states will be immensely benefitted by availing metro services after getting down at Howrah station," he added.
Senior railway officials maintain that in the past nine years, from 2014 to 2023, Indian Railways has given a big push to complete all pending railway infrastructure projects in West Bengal.
They say the average budget outlay during 2009 to 2014 was Rs 4,380 crore which has been increased to more than twice in the last nine years.
"In 2024-25 fiscal, railway budget outlay for West Bengal stands at Rs 13,810 crore which is 215% more in comparison to the average budget outlay of 2009-2014," another railway official said.
He added, "A number of metro railway projects in Calcutta which have been pending for long have been expedited over the last nine years." Indian railway officials say that an expenditure of Rs 18,212 crore has been made to complete these metro projects in Kolkata and its surrounding areas from 2014 to 2023, whereas an expenditure of only Rs 5,981 crore was made since its inception up to the year 2014.
