New Ctg-Cox’s Bazar railway track cost may rise tenfold

Munima Sultana | Published: April 13, 2016 00:00:00 | Updated: February 01, 2018 00:00:00

The cost of Chittagong-Cox's Bazar new railway track project is likely to swell ten-fold from its original one, surpassing recent estimation by the Ministry of Railway due to change of route to bypass the cantonment.
The MoR earlier proposed a seven-fold increase of cost from the original one only three months before due to the need for adjusting prices of land and others with inflation during the last five years.
Although the Planning Commission refrained from approving the revised development project proposal (RDPP) of the project during the project evaluation committee meeting in January, the sources said the MoR has to revise the cost by Tk 50 billion (Tk 5,000 crore) again for acquiring more lands for change of the route.
They said the MoR proposed to change the route as the Ministry of Defence recently sent a request to divert Dohazari (Chittagong)-RamuÂ (Cox's Bazar) rail track from the cantonment area proposing to use Teknaf-Cox's Bazar road.
In the RDPP, the total cost of the project has been estimated at Tk 180.3 billion which was Tk 1.85 billion (Tk 1,852 crore) in the DPP approved in June 2010. The RDPP proposed to revise the cost to Tk 130.2 billion (Tk 13,029 crore).
Official sources said the extra cost will be needed for acquiring 35 acres more land and building extra tracks and small bridges and culverts on the diverted route. They, however, said the total length of the rail track remains within 128 kilometres.
However, the budget for land acquisition during three months has increased by Tk 2.3Â billion (Tk 2,300 crore). The RDPP showed the cost for land acquisition at Tk 1.4 billion which is now being proposed to increase to Tk 3.73 billion in the fresh revision.
Besides, the BR showed an additional cost of Tk 2.8 billion (Tk 2,805 crore) to construct extra track and Tk 12.3 billion (Tk 12,395 crore) for more bridges due to change of route.
The officials said as per requirement of the Asian Development Bank, the project's potential development partner, Tk 2.04 billion has been kept for environmental safeguard.
The ADB in principle agreed to finance the project for establishing regional connectivity as it has so far provided technical support to conduct feasibility study. The new track is to establish link with Trans Asian Railway Corridor and ensure development of tourism facilities in tourist city Cox's Bazar by developing rail communication system.
The ministry has also revised the timeframe of the project from 2020 to 2022. The original DPP, however, showed the project implementation time in 2013.
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