I am not against metro rail, says Deve Gowda

I am not against metro rail, says Deve Gowda

The Hindu

BANGALORE: The President of the Janata Dal (S) and MP, H.D. Deve Gowda, said on Saturday that it is for the Chief Minister, N. Dharam Singh, and the Government to decide on the implementation of the metro rail system for Bangalore, and that he has only placed facts before the administration and the Prime Minister, Manmohan Singh.

He told presspersons here that he is neither in favour of the project nor against it. He is not pleading the case of monorail or the ELRTS (elevated light rail transit system) as made out in certain quarters. The Veerappa Moily government approved the ELRTS in 1994, and the Janata Dal government which succeeded it sought to implement it. However, the ELRTS was abandoned in 2003 and the metro rail project taken up by the then Government (of the Congress).

Mr. Deve Gowda said experience has shown that in New Delhi and Kolkata, the metro rail system has not yielded results as an effective mass transit system. It has proved to be expensive and a burden on the Government, which has been forced to subsidise the operational costs, he added.

He said: "I have brought these facts to the notice of the Chief Minister, and it is for him to decide whether to go ahead with the implementation of the project or not. I have nothing more to say. The implementation of the metro rail system will have no bearing on the relations between the Janata Dal (S) and the Congress in Karnataka."

Mr. Deve Gowda said the Delhi Government recently opted for an "urban transport integration scheme" since the metro rail has failed to ease congestion on roads. It has appointed B.I. Singhal as adviser for the implementation of the scheme. The cost of subsidy for the metro rail system is nearly Rs. 4 per passenger if 20 lakh passengers use it daily, he said.