The Centre is not on the same page with the State government on the Thiruvananthapuram-Kasaragod SilverLine semi-high-speed rail corridor project since its standard gauge track will hamper interoperability with trains that operate on the country’s 70,000-km broad gauge network, Union Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw has said.
Speaking to The Hindu here on Tuesday, he said the 530-km SilverLine corridor would thus remain as an isolated one, cut off from rest of the rail network. Terming its per-km cost of ₹120 crore submitted by State government as an underestimation, he said it would realistically cost between ₹200 and ₹250 crore.
“This will result in the project cost escalating, once work begins at a lesser estimate. We feel hurt when it is politicised, since it is a technical subject and must be handled by people having deep domain knowledge.”
