With just months to go for simultaneous Legislative Assembly and Lok Sabha polls in Andhra Pradesh, the state is witnessing heated politics over the latest move by the Centre to fulfill a long-pending demand by granting a new railway zone with its headquarters at Visakhapatnam. Earlier this week, Railway Minister Piyush Goyal announced the new railway zone, as committed by the Centre under the Andhra Pradesh Reorganisation Act 2014.
However, all has not gone down well as both the Andhra Pradesh and Odisha government have taken up issues with the new zone.
The new zone has been named South Coast Railway (SCoR) and will comprise Guntakal, Guntur and Vijayawada divisions. However, it splits the Waltair division into two; one to be incorporated in the new zone by merging with the neighbouring Vijayawada division, and the other to be converted into a new division with headquarters at Rayagada in Odisha under East Coast Railway (ECoR).
Bifurcation of Waltair divison
The Waltair division netted Rs 7,053.12 crore revenue, including Rs 6,515.38 crore from freight and Rs 536.73 crore from passenger traffic, in 2017-18.
The ruling Telugu Desam Party (TDP) has contended that a large chunk of the revenue will be diverted to newly formed Rayagada division in Odisha as the majority of the area, including Vizianagaram and Srikakulam districts of Andhra Pradesh, were merged with it.
Lashing out at Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Chief Minister N Chandrababu Naidu even alleged that the Centre denied Andhra Pradesh Rs 7,000 crore revenue with this move.
Andhra IT Minister Nara Lokesh, who is also Naidu’s son, claimed that the part of Waltair division merged with East Coast Railway was earning Rs 6,500 crore annually through freight traffic while the part given to the new zone has revenues of only Rs 500 crore through passenger traffic.
"During bifurcation of the state, revenue-making Hyderabad was given away to Telangana and now revenue-making part of Waltair division has been given to Odisha," he said.
Meanwhile the Biju Janata Dal (BJD) has called the move 'death bell to railways in Odisha' as the old Waltair division was headquartered at the state’s capital in Bhubaneshwar and has now been split.
"With the creation of South Coast Railway with headquarters at Vishakapatnam and transferring major assets and part of the Waltair Railway Division (Vishakapatnam) to this new Railway Zone, it is yet another attempt by the Centre to destroy the railways in Odisha. If the BJP is acceding to a political decision in case of Andhra Pradesh, why is it neglecting the rightful demand of Odisha for having the state as one Zone of ECoR under its jurisdiction," the BJD
said in a statement.