100 per cent electrification completed for train services in Tripura: Minister

Amid the Northeast Frontier Railway’s (NFR) all-out efforts to run the much-anticipated electric locomotive-powered trains from Tripura in the near future, state Power Minister Ratan Lal Nath on Wednesday announced that Tripura State Electricity Corporation (TSECL) has completed 100 per cent electrification work of the 271 km long railway track in the state.

The Power Minister after inaugurating the 132 KV transmission lines and 132 KV Feeder Bays for Railway Traction Electrification in Agartala railway station complex, said that in 1964, the train first arrived in Dharmanagar in Northern Tripura and it took 44 years to link capital city Agartala in 2008, and the train reached Sabroom in southern Tripura in 2019.

“In these seven years, and after Narendra Modi took charge in 2014 as Prime Minister, the broad gauge conversion line was completed in Tripura. It was a meter gauge earlier. The international rail link connection from Agartala to Akhaura of Bangladesh was completed in 2023. Present state and the Central government know how to develop and ensure the progress of a state,” Nath said.

The total broad gauge length is 271 km from Churaibari (along southern Assam) to Sabroom along India-Bangladesh border in southern Tripura, and within just seven years, all work was done.

Under the Amrit Bharat Scheme, work is underway in four Tripura railway stations -- Agartala, Udaipur, Kumarghat, and Dharmanagar.

Nath, who also holds the Agriculture portfolio, also said that now 19 trains are running from Tripura.

An official said that trial runs of the passenger trains with an electric locomotive were successfully conducted earlier between Agartala railway station and southern Assam’s Arunachal Junction railway station in Assam’s Cachar district.

“Before regular running of electric passenger trains, such trial runs are mandatory. A few more trials of trains driven by electric locomotives are likely to be conducted before regular running of electric trains from Tripura,” the official said.

He said that before the trial runs of the passenger trains, the first goods train trial run with an electric locomotive was successfully conducted on February 6 between southern Assam’s Badarpur station and Tripura’s Jirania station, 15 km north of Agartala railway station.

As the infrastructure with electric railway lines is getting ready, the iconic Vande Bharat Express trains will be extended up to Assam’s Silchar and Agartala within the next few months, the NFR official said.

Tripura is now well connected with Delhi, Kolkata, Mumbai, Firozpur, Patna and other cities of the country by several express trains, but passenger train services have been solely powered by diesel engines.

A Rs 46 crore electrification project was launched in 2022 to connect Tripura with the national railway grid with electric trains.