Finally, the Indian Railways reaches Manipur and it is a great development against Northeast insurgents

Putting the Northeastern state of Manipur on the railway map of the country, a passenger Rajdhani Express train from Assam’s Silchar Railway Station, reached the Vaingaichunpao Railway Station on a trial run on Friday. Chief Minister N Biren Singh took to Twitter to post the video of the successful trial run and thanked Prime Minister Narendra Modi for the transformation.

“Historic moment for Manipur as the first trial run of a passenger train from Silchar to Vaingaichunpao in Tamenglong was successfully conducted on Friday. The people of Manipur are immensely grateful to PM @narendramodi Ji for the transformation brought under his leadership,” tweeted N Biren Singh.

The railway officials who had boarded the train halted briefly at the Jiribam Railway Station, where they hoisted the Indian national flag, sang the national anthem, and were also greeted by the cheerful locals. In a few days, Union Railway Minister Piyush Goyal is expected to himself inaugurate the railway line.

According to officials concerned with the developments, the plan is to reach Imphal and eventually construct the last railway station at Moreh, Manipur’s border town. According to an East Mojo report, the officials revealed that the Vaingaichunpao-Imphal railway line is also under construction, mainly tunneling, to complete the longest railway tunnel near Imphal.

In the past year, 29 super-critical projects totaling 1,044 km in length and costing Rs 11,588 crore were completed. The Indian Railways has identified 58 ‘Super Critical Projects’ totaling 3750 km in length and costing Rs 39,663 crore. A total of 27 of these 58 ‘Super Critical Projects’ will be completed by December 2021, with the remaining two projects expected to be completed by March 2022.

Despite the bottlenecks caused by COVID-19 induced restrictions and the difficulty in traversing the challenging terrain, the Indian Railways has been working at a breath-neck pace, hitherto unseen. The accomplishment will help the locals in Manipur connect directly with Silchar Town and allow them a convenient mobile transportation option.

Manipur was once known for insurgency and separatist groups but now due to the efforts of the BJP government under the leadership of Chief Minister N Biren Singh, the militants are turning towards the mainstream. As reported by TFI, the Manipur CM had revealed back in February that his government is in talks with the Centre to get AFSPA removed from Manipur, which proved how the BJP government of the state has been able to curb the insurgency and militancy issues of Manipur.

Read more: AFSPA could be removed from Manipur and it could happen very soon

Yet, certain separatist and militant groups still dwell in the remotest areas of Manipur, who are against infrastructural development in the Northeast as it would hamper their nefarious plans. However, with the Indian Railways reaching Manipur, the development will pace up even in the remotest parts of the Northeast, which would be a major jolt to insurgents.

The Northeast had been neglected for far too long in the previous UPA regimes but the Narendra Modi government has made a conscious effort to assimilate the seven sisters into the mainstream. Although it is a sad realisation that decades after independence, states like Manipur had to wait for the Modi government to turn up and transform the infrastructure.