Andhra Pradesh: Land acquisition for rail line soon

Eluru: The long-awaited Kotipalli-Narasapur railway line work is all set to get momentum as the West Godavari district administration is getting ready to acquire land at an estimated cost of Rs 60 crore. West Godavari collector K. Bhaskar in a meeting held here on Saturday said that the Centre had taken initiative to go ahead with the works and added that accordingly, they would start land acquisition and hand it over to the railway authorities to go ahead with laying railway line connecting Kotipalli to Narasapur. He asked the local railway authorities to make efforts to get the amount released soon to take up land acquisition. 

The collector also said that doubling of Bhimavaram to Vijaywada railway line would also be taken up soon with no change in the present alignment. He expressed concern over inordinate delay in laying NH-216 and said that though the required land was acquired and handed over to the main contract agency of TATA, it handed over the works to the sub-contractor and the works were pending for two years. 

He said that they would write a letter to the main contractor to find out as to why there was a long delay in executing the entrusted works. He said that works worth Rs 200 crore were sanctioned for construction of rehabilitation colonies with all requisite amenities for Polavaram irrigation project affected people at four places in the district and asked the concerned officials to bring about awareness among the contractors on what kind of works they were supposed to do in order to get the works done in an expeditious manner. He directed the officials to complete land survey for laying Devarapalli-Jeelugumilli road by end of November.