Jammu: As the direct train from Delhi to Kashmir becomes a reality, the government of India is preparing to grant Jammu a new railway division when Prime Minister Narendra Modi virtually inaugurates the office of Divisional Railway Manager (DRM) on January 6. This will end the dependency of Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, and the Pathankot area of Punjab on the Firozpur division.
Giving details, Additional Divisional Railway Manager (ADRM) Jammu Rajiv Kumar Singh said that a function will be held outside the platform area of Jammu railway station in which Minister of State (MoS) in Prime Minister Office (PMO) Dr Jitendra Singh, Member of Parliament Jammu Jugal Kishore Sharma, and others will be attending the event. Around 4000 to 5000 people are expected to attend the pathbreaking function, he said.
“All the decisions are taken at a divisional level regarding railways, and earlier people of J&K, HP, and Panthakot had to go to Firozpur for that purpose. But now all the work of the division will be taken from here,” the ADRM said.
Jammu will be the sixth railway division of the northern railways zone after Delhi, Ambala, Lucknow, Moradabad, and Firozpur. The railway division works under railway zones, and there are 19 zones across India. The divisions are the subcategories of the zones, and each division is run by a Divisional Railway Manager (DRM). The DRM is responsible for the operation and maintenance of the division and has to report to the general manager of his zone.
Once inaugurated, Jammu Railway Station will also get a new look, and already work is underway to extend the platform capacities of Jammu Railway Station from three to seven. “All the existing buildings will be dismantled and new infrastructure will come up here,” Rajiv Kumar Singh said.
Three New Trains To Be Operational Soon
Meanwhile, northern railways have issued a train operation plan for the Kashmir Valley for the winter periods in which they have included three new trains from Shri Vaishno Devi Katra (SVDK) to Srinagar, which include a Vande Bharat train and two Mail Express trains that will be running daily.
As per the chart issued by the northern railways, the Vande Bharat train will be leaving from Katra at 8:10 am and will be reaching Srinagar at 11:20 am; the Mail Express train will be leaving from Katra at 9:50 am and will reach Srinagar at 1:10 pm; and another Mail Express train will be leaving Katra at 3 pm and will be reaching Srinagar at 6:20 pm.
Though the chart has been issued, no final date for the start of the train service to Kashmir has been given yet. To move one step closer, another visit of Commissioner Railway Safety (CRS) will be held soon.
“CRS visit to Katra is expected on January 6 and 7, and any decision for a train to Kashmir depends on that,” the ADRM Jammu added.
History Of Train In J&K
Jammu has seen many ups and downs since the train service started up to Udhampur first and then up to Katra. Before 1947 there was a direct train service between Jammu and Sialkot in undivided India, which had started in 1890, but after the partition of the country in 1947, the train service snapped. It was after the 1965 war between India and Pakistan that the work on train service from Pathankot in Punjab towards Jammu started, and it opened in 1972.
The first train to Jammu started with the name Srinagar Express, now Jhelum Express, and since then other trains also arrived in the winter capital. The latest among them all is the Vande Bharat Express, which is expected to become the first train to go to Kashmir directly from the national capital.
In 1981 the Jammu to Udhampur train project was taken up, but the foundation stone was laid by the then Prime Minister Indira Gandhi on April 14, 1983. After missing several deadlines, on April 13, 2005, the then PM Manmohan Singh flagged off the train service to Udhampur, which is also the headquarters of the northern command.
After that, it was the turn of Kashmir Valley to witness trains running, and from October 11, 2009, onwards, different sections of local train service were started, and on July 4, 2014, direct train service to Katra, the base camp of the Mata Vaishno Devi shrine, was also started, and PM Narendra Modi flagged off the same.
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