In the Railway budget 2009-10, central Railway Minister Mamta Banerjee has proposed Rajkot-Viramgam track, Hapa-Veraval and Gandhidham-Kandla double lines works. Ahmedabad-Mumbai non stop train and proposed development of Ahmedabad and Porbandar Railway stations, are two new welcome steps in the budget.

weekly,linked,parcel etc. are new trains

Among 57 new regular trains announced, Gujarat has got four trains: Gandhidham-Howrah Super fast train is a weekly train, means just once in a week. It seems that this train has also been announced keeping in mind the people of West Bengal who needs to come to Gandhidham for employment purpose. Another train ‘Veraval-Mumbai daily’ which has been announced as a ‘new train’ in the budget is actually just a ‘link service’. One train Hapa-Tirunelveli is superfast and will be operated twice a week. Another one train is vapi-tughlakabad parcel train. Two new trains Mumbai-Jodhpur weekly and Mumbai-Jodhpur-Bikaner, bi-weekly will pass from Gujarat. Another train Mumbai-Jaipur Garib Rath which passes through Gujarat has been extended to Delhi in north.

Frequency increase for 2 Gujarat bound trains

The Minister of Railways, Kumari Mamata Banerjee has announced increase in frequency of 13 trains of the country including two Gujarat bound trains.

According to the budget announcement, frequency of 2957/2958 Ahmedabad-New Delhi Rajdhani Express has been increased from 6 days to daily.

Frequency of another Gujarat bound train 2905/2906 Porbander-Howrah (via Hapa) has been increased from 2 days to 3 days.

Extension to one train of Gujarat

The Minister announced extension of 27 trains among which, Gujarat has got extension of only one train. 9269/9270 Porbandar-Bapudham Motihari has been extended to Muzaffarpur (Bi-weekly).

Gujarat govt. criticizes the budget

Meanwhile the Gujarat Government has lodged strong protest against alleged injustice to Gujarat in Railway budget. Gujarat government spokespersons Minister Jai Narayan Vyas and Saurabh Patel said, this budget is one more example of injustice that the state faces. Ministers said, Gujarat’s ports are gateways for whole north-west India, but in today’s budget, issue of Port-Railway connection has been ignored.

“Gujarat had demanded 16 new trains, 9 gauge transfers, extension of 9 trains and 10 new railway tracks. Not a single ladies special train has been allotted to Gujarat. Somnath, Dwarka, Junagadh, Dakor are not included in multi-function railway complex. Ahmedabad-Mumbai Bullet train is nowhere in the budget. The budget has ignored Gujarat government’s demands about coal linkage and salt workers development,” Ministers said.

“Extension of Kolkata Metro Rail has been mentioned in the budget but, Ahmedabad has been deprived. There is nothing in the budget to address Ahmedabad’s longstanding demand for Metro Rail. Gandhinagar is the only state capital in the country which is not connected with New Delhi. There is nothing on this in the budget. Gujarat Tourism’s Palace on Wheels train was snatched away in the name of gauge conversation problem. Now we demand this train and the Railway Ministry is completely silent on this issue in the budget,” Vyas and Saurabh Patel added.