‘Patti-Makhu rail link still a distant dream’

Amritsar, June 2

“The much sought after Patti-Makhu rail link that was ‘gazetted’ by the state Congress government was nothing but a political move.”

This was stated by Rajya Sabha Member and former BJP State President Shwait Malik. “It was the lax policy of Capt Amarinder led government to declare the project during the last leg of its tenure. How could the land acquisition formalities be furnished within seven months’ remaining span? It was nothing but another ‘lollipop’ of the state Congress to garner poll favours,” he said.

He claimed that the project to connect Amritsar with Ferozepur was conceived when Dr Manmohan Singh was the PM and Pawan Bansal was the Railway Minister. “It was lingered for the past 10 years. “When I became Rajya Sabha member in 2016, I raised this project in the Parliament and got Rs 299 crore sanctioned with the intervention of PM Narendra Modi and the then minister Arun Jaitley. But this amount remained un utilised as the state government could not spare Rs 40 crore to acquire the land for the past four years,” he said. — TNS