No ‘Railgadi’ for Poonch: BJP leaders exposed over much-hyped Jammu-Poonch rail link

No ‘Railgadi’ for Poonch: BJP leaders exposed over much-hyped Jammu-Poonch rail link

POONCH TODAY NEWS

POONCH: After the BJP-led NDA government came to power in 2014, MP Jugal Kishore Sharma, who was representing the Jammu-Poonch parliamentary constituency, said that the government would start a survey on the Jammu-Poonch railway line, and the work would be started after the survey.

Many Jammu and Poonch-Rajouri-based BJP leaders tried their best to hit the media limelight on the issue. The BJP leaders were seen showing a ‘blue moon’ to the people of Akhnoor, Rajouri, and Poonch, but all of them have been exposed now. A few days back during the parliamentary session, Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw said, “A survey for a new 223-km rail line between Jammu and Poonch via Akhnoor and Rajouri was carried out, and the project cost was assessed as Rs 22,771 crore, but it has low traffic projections.” The statement of the union railway minister is a complete indication that the GOI, even after conducting the survey, is reluctant to start the work on this Jammu-Poonch railway line soon due to low traffic projections. Meanwhile, in the Kashmir division, a number of districts have been covered through the rail network. It shows that for the government of India, the Kashmir division is more important and not border areas of the Jammu division like Rajouri and Poonch, which require proper connectivity through road and railway. After the statement of the railway minister, the BJP leaders who were earlier seen politicizing the issue with their social media announcements on the railway line between Jammu and Poonch now have become silent. It shows that they played with the sentiments of the people of Rajouri and Poonch by not pressing the government strongly for the start of the work on the Jammu-Poonch railway line after the completion of the survey. This unexpected development is enough to show that the people of Poonch and Rajouri will have to wait for more years to travel in ‘Railgadi,’ which always remained a distant dream for the people of the border belt.