Metro rail: PIB meet delay will affect work

Metro rail: PIB meet delay will affect work
Deccan Herald

The postponement of the project investment board meeting has delayed the start of construction work until August.

It seems there are only ‘tomorrows’ for the Bangalore Metro Rail. The second and hopefully final round of the Project Investment Board meet that Chief Minister Dharam Singh and Bangalore Mass Rapid Transit Limited (BMRTL) Managing Director K N Shrivatsava planned on July 5 or July 6, did not take place.

As Deccan Herald had reported earlier, the steady postponement of the PIB meeting has delayed the commencement of construction work from July to August. The BMRTL is yet to receive confirmation about the exact date of the meeting.

“We are not yet sure when the meeting will be held. Maybe we will be informed about it tomorrow,” Shrivatsava told Deccan Herald from New Delhi.

Monorail vs Metrorail

Meanwhile, the monorail Vs metrorail argument continues, with the Brigade’s Shops and Establishments Association being the latest to oppose the nearly-approved Bangalore Metro project.

The Association has written a letter to Chief Minister Dharam Singh accusing the State Government of “not taking the public into confidence” regarding the project.

“The Government should have consulted the people who are going to be directly affected by the project. Instead, it has only consulted MLAs and MPs,” read the letter written on July 5.

Voting for the monorail system, terming it as a “superior alternative”, the letter added that its advantages were that it did not include any demolition and dislocation of existing traffic even during the construction stages.