After Cong, BJP also 'red flags' Kerala's Silver Line project

hiruvananthapuram, Oct 23 (IANS) After the Congress-led UDF team, which was given the task of studying the Rs 63,941 crore Silver Line (K-Rail) project, a state of the art joint venture of the Indian Railways and the Kerala government said that this is an unviable project and should not be allowed to go forward, the BJP's state unit on Friday has also come out strongly against it.

State BJP president K. Surendran said it has now been proved beyond doubt that this project will do no good for the state.

"The need of the hour is (Chief Minister Pinarayi) Vijayan should see that steps are taken to drop this project as this is not going to help the state in any manner. All are surprised on why Vijayan is determined on going forward with this very expensive project. He should see that a discussion be mooted with Metroman E.Sreedharan on what's best for Kerala. Vijayan is doing everything to pressurise the Centre to clear the project and the Kerala BJP will do everything to see that this project does not take place," he said.

This is one of the Chief Minister's pet project - setting up a 529.45 km corridor connecting Thiruvananthapuram to Kasaragod.

A semi high speed train will be able to travel this stretch in a matter of 4 hours at an operational speed of 200 km per hour.

These trains will cover the busy Thiruvananthapuram-Ernakulam stretch in 90 minutes, as against the present over four hours.

Silver Line will be running parallel to the existing railway line from Kasaragod to Tirur, while an alternative green-field alignment has been chosen for Tirur- Thiruvananthapuram stretch.

Vijayan had mooted this project in his first term (2016-21) and it is presently lying before the Centre.

Incidentally this fresh opposition comes at a time, when the ongoing Assembly session has already been told by Vijayan that the project will be taken up.