By IAns
New Delhi : A two-year-old dispute between Kerala and Tamil Nadu over creating a Salem railway division was resolved Tuesday as a new formula of sharing the railway network was agreed to.
At a meeting convened by Railway Minister Lalu Prasad, MPs belonging to the two states have agreed that 79 kilometres of railway line from the Madurai division would be transferred to the Palakkad division making the bifurcation of the latter more equitable.
The Kerala MPs, who were protesting against the creation of the Salem division in Tamil Nadu alleging that existing Palakkadu division was bifurcated unscientifically to do so, said that the new formula was acceptable to them.
“We are happy that a two-year dispute is resolved without hurting the relationship with our neighbour,” P. Karunakaran, an MP from Kerala, told IANS.
Under the formula derived during the discussions with Lalu Prasad and railway officials, 58 kilometres of railway line in Palakkad-Pollachi and 21 kilometres of Pollachi-Kinnattukadavu would be transferred from the Madurai division to the Palakkad division.
Kerala had protested when routes totalling 623 kms taken out of the Palakkad division (of its 1,142 km) to create the Salem division. “But now both divisions – Palakkad and Salem – have almost the same (length of routes) under their jurisdiction,” Karunakaran said, adding that there would be an increase in their revenue also.
The proposed Salem division is expected to have 623 route km from the Palakkad division, 135 km from Tiruchirapalli and 85 km of new line. Kerala’s contention was that after the proposed bifurcation, the Palakkad division would have 509 km of existing line and 36 kms of new line under construction.
With the new formula the Palakkad division would have 588 kms.
Lalu Prasad also assured the Kerala MPs that no employee would be transferred forcibly to the Salem division unless there is a request and there would not be any shifting of offices. He said no decision has been taken on Kerala’s demand for a new West Coast railway zone.
Both Kerala Chief Minister V.S. Achuthanandan and his Tamil Nadu counterpart M. Karunanidhi were informed about the decision.
The MPs from Kerala, who have met Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Congress president Sonia Gandhi on the issue, have been maintaining that they don’t have anything against the creation of a Salem division but don’t want Palakkad to be downgraded.
Manmohan Singh has suggested that the railway minister should convene a meeting of both chief ministers to solve the dispute amicably. He had assured the Kerala MPs that no decision would be taken about the inauguration of the Salem division until the dispute was resolved.
Achuthanandan met the prime minister Sunday to discuss the issue.
The Kerala MPs who participated in Tuesday’s meeting are Karunakaran and N.N. Krishnadas of the Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M), C.K. Chandrappan of Communist Party of India (CPI), P.J. Kurien of the Congress, M.P. Virendrakumar of the Janata Dal-Secular and P.C. Thomas of the Kerala Congress-Joseph.
Tamil Nadu MPs – K.V. Thangabalu (Congress), N. Siva and A. Krishnaswamy (DMK), P.R. Senthil (PMK), P. Mohan (CPI-M) and Subbaraya (CPI) – were led by Shipping Minister T.R. Balu in the 90-minute-long discussion.
CPI-M politburo member Sitaram Yehcury was also present