Railway Messiahs of Karnataka

ENARADA, Hubli

By  Mathihalli Madan Mohan

Call it as a case of coincidence or a product of quirk of circumstances. Karnataka has had a fare share in managing the Union Railway Ministry than others. It has produced around a dozen Railway Ministers since independence, starting from late H C Dasappa (1963-64) to the present incumbent Mr. Mallikarjun Kharge, including a political heavy weight personality like former Chief Minister, Mr. Kengal Hanumanthaiah.  Of them were two non domicile Kannadigas like George Fernandes (Bihar) and Mr Suresh Kalmadi (Maharashtra).

But this hardly helped the improvement of the indifferent railway net work, in Karnataka, a product of unison of the regions coming from different administrative cultures.  Of them only have proved to be the Railway messiahs of Karnataka, namely C K Jaffer Sharief, and the present Minister Mr. Mallikarjun Kharge. Mr. Sharief had had a longer stint than others both as Minister of State (1980-84) and Union Minister (1991-95) before he demitted office in the wake of corruption charges in 1995.  Mr. Kharge is going to have a short tenure of less than one year, with the term of the present loksabha expiring shortly.

The two others from Karnataka, namely  late T.A.Pai   and the non-domicile Kannadigas Mr.  George Fernandes as the Union Railway Ministers, Karnataka   the prestigious Konkan Railway providing rail link along the West Coast of Maharashtra, Goa and Karnataka materialised, bringing the rail travel facilities to the people of Dakshina Kannada and Uttar Kannada. While it was during the days of Prof Madhu Dandavate and Mr. Ram Naik (both from Maharashtra) an alternative rail link between Mumbai and Bangalore was given via Miraj and Hubli, notwithstanding the fact that Karnataka had meter gauge and Maharashtra had broad gauge tracks (which was regularized when the unigauge programme materailised.) and Kolhapur in Maharashtra, the abode of Mahalaxmi got a rail link with Tirupati the abode of Lord Venkateshwara. On  the other hand, Suresh Kalmadi, who  held the railway portfolio after Jaffer Sharief demitted office, sat needlessly on papers  on the formation of  new railway zone  with Hubli as the headquarters.

Kharge’s debut in the Railways was a more by coincidence than by design. His was a stopgap arrangement having been pitch forked into the position, when Mr. Bansal, his predecessor had to quit under cloud. Besides, the Congress High Command had to suitably reward him, for giving up his claims for the post of the Chief Minister of Karnataka, with the former preferring Mr. Siddaramaiah last year. With the UPA looks unlikely to get renewal of lease of power, the prospects of Kharge continued as the Railway Minister in the next term of loksabha, just do not arise at all.

Before the advent of Mr. Sharief, Karnataka was a meter gauge island, as it were, with the  broad-gauge going in the periphery and the people of Hyderabad Karnataka,, especially from Gulbarga and Raichur, which were on the  broad gauge artery linking Chennai and Mumbai, had to switch over to meter gauge at Guntakal to reach  the state capital of Bangalore. Thanks to the unigauge programme initiated during his days, the railway network in Karnataka went a transformation.

And one of the biggest beneficiaries in the process was the Northern Karnataka, the backward region of the state, which has been a victim of the absence of proper political leadership.  What good turn Mr. Sharif has done to the northern region, has not been done by any home hewn politician of the region. The broad gauge link from Mumbai, which had moved upto Miraj in 1971, and stopped, moving downwards towards Bangalore, was completed   after more than two decades in the nineties under the aegis of Mr. Sharief,   fulfilling one of the felt needs of the state and the region. He also took steps to provide broad gauge link between Hubli and Solapur via Bagalkot and Bijapur, through conversion, which was realised after he went out of office. He also initiated work on the interior lines like Guntakal Chikjajur, and Kottur-Harihar, of which the first was completed and second one is nearing completion now. But for the ground work done by in extending the broad gauge net work, it would have been well nigh impossible for Hubli to become the zonal headquarters of the new South Western Railway.

Though the  railway  development net work had still  lot of gaps,  the  progress was sluggish  after the exit of Mr. Sharief, though in the meantime, Mr. Basangouda Patil ( 2003-04) from Bijapur, and Mr. K H Muniyappa (2009) from Kolar (albeit for a short time) had  functioned as Ministers of State. The only notable development in the meantime was that Solapur-Bijapur-Bagalkot-Gadag-Hubli line became operational to and Hubli was made into headquarters of the South Western Zone, (which the former Prime Minister Mr. Devegowda wanted to be in Bangalore) during the NDA regime at the Centre after   a protracted agitation to mark another milestone in the history of railway development in Karnataka.

After the exit of; Mr. Sharief in 1995, the stewardship of the Railway Ministry returned to Karnataka only in June 2013 with Mr. Mallikarjun Kharge being entrusted with the responsibility. Within the limitations of time at his disposal, Mr. Kharge continued the work left halfway done by Mr. Sharief and his focus of attention  was  his home base Gulbarga. (Incidentally, of the five districts which form part of the   Hyderabad Karnataka, only  Koppal comes under South Western railway while, the rest are under South Central and Central railways).

In the days preceding the presentation of railway budget, Mr. Kharge sanctioned  a  Rs. 750 crore railway coach factory at Yadgir, introduced  pit line  facility at Gulbarga to enable the origination of trains,  and  initiated  steps to setup an administrative office of the Solapur division of the Central railway at Gulbarga (which forms part of the Solapur division) as a prelude to the setting up of separate railway division at Gulbarga, introduce Solapur Bombay night train, and Hubli Secunderabad  via Bijapur and Gulbarga,  and Bidar Bangalore , both triweekly expresses.. He has substantially   increased the allocation for the new line Bidar Gulbarga railway line. The new line has already become functional between Bidar and Humnabad, and yet to reach Gulbarga.

In the railway budget, of the 72 new services promised, Gulbarga and the Northern Karnataka get a lion share of around 16.  Gulbarga gets six   weekly express trains including premier weekly trains between Yesvantpur-Jaipur and Bangalore-Patna, Yesvantpur-Katra and Aurangabad-Renigunta, Mumbai-Chennai via K R Pura, and biweekly Varanasi-Mysore trains, besides a daily intercity train between Gulbarga and Hyderabad. In addition, the frequency of the existing triweekly trains between Bidar-Yesvantpur, Hubli-Bijapur and Secunderabad, has been increased to make them as daily trains. Hubli, another hub of activities of the Northern Karnataka, gets its first direct train, albeit a weekly train to Mumbai, via Bijapur and Solapur, instead of the normal route to Mumbai via Miraj and a fast passenger train is to run between Hubli and Belgaum. In addition the frequency of the triweekly train service between Hubli and Vijayawada has been made into a daily. The services made available to other region of the state  include, a premium weekly train between Bangalore -Thiruvananthpur, a daily express train between  Bangalore- Chennai,  a weekly A/C train between Yesvantpur-Howrah,   and Thiruvanantapur-Mangalore Nizamuddeen, express trains.

Just after presentation of the budget, Mr. Kharge said that the foundation stone for laying of the new railway line between  Wadi (Gulbarga dist) and Gadag (near Hubli) would be laid by the end of this month The 252.4 km long railway line estimated to cost Rs. 1922.14 crores provides direct connectivity between  the  Hyderabad Karnataka and Bombay Karnataka region. Expected to be completed in about six years, the new line would reduce the distance between the Northern Karnataka and Hyderabad and gives a boost to the economic activities in the region. Elsewhere the intercity express between Madgaon (Goa) and Mangalore, the introduction of which had been made in the last budget, would become operational from 23rd of this month.

This has to be considered as nothing short of a bonanza for the Northern Karnataka region, which has hardly received any attention after the Jaffer Sharief era and all this has been achieved within a short period of assumption of office by Mr. Mallikarjun Kharge, which is highly creditable under any circumstances.

Though this is considered as a major step forward after what Mr. Jaffer Sharief   had done, however does not solve all the major problems, though some have been attended. There has been a clamour for  the formation of the separate Mangalore Division by bringing the Konkan  Railway areas of Karnataka-Goa region, since the port town has not been getting deal from Palghat division of the Southern Railway, and formation of another railway division with Gulbarga as headquarters for the entire Hyderabad Karnataka area , which is now served by the two railway zones  of South Central and Central, so that the entire Karnataka comes under single zone of South Western Railway. Besides Hubli Ankola new railway line, linking the hinterland land of Northern Karnataka and Southern Maharashtra, been caught in a warp of environment and got stuck. Another proposal for linking Munirabad with the Mehboobnagar providing the train facility to Hyderabad Karnataka region, which interalia would bring down the distance between the region and Hyderabad, sanctioned during the regime of United Development Front of Mr. Devegowda has been languishing for want of attention.

Mr.  Kharge would have certainly attended to these pending problems. But time at his disposal is quite short. He is in office   till the expiry of the present term of the loksabha. Political uncertainty hangs over the ability of the Congress led UPA getting the third term. Though by chance the UPA is able to make it, despite all indications to the contrary, Mr. Kharge is unlikely to get the portfolio of Railways, which is in the quota given to the alliance partners.  Will Karnataka have to wait for another messiah to complete process?

(Posted on February 15 , 2014 @ 11.30 am)

(Author is a Senior Journalist and Columnist.  Mobile: +91 94480 74872     He can be contacted on  madan.mm@gmail.com)

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