The Dhaka-Mawa part of the Dhaka to Bhanga railway line via the Padma Bridge will be ready for train operation by this September.
Railways Minister Md Nurul Islam Sujan shared this after inaugurating the Bhanga-Jashore railway line construction. “Train operation on the 81km Dhaka-Bhanga part will start in September,” he said.
Furthermore, the Dhaka-Jashore railway line will be ready for train operation by June next year.
Currently, construction work is going on in 14 stations of the railway.
According to the project information, 20 stations are being constructed on the railway line from Kamalapur to Jashore under the Padma Rail Connection Project. Of these, 14 stations will be new. The six old stations will be revamped to make them up to date.
The railway line was constructed in three parts (plus a 3km link being built between Dhaka and Gandaria) — a 37km Gandaria-Mawa section, a 42km Mawa-Bhanga section, and an 87km Bhanga Junction-Jashore section. Some 43.2km of loops, siding and Y-connections bring the total track length to 215.2km.
The Padma Bridge was opened for vehicular movement on June 26 last year. On August 20, nearly two months after the bridge inauguration, the railways minister inaugurated the work of laying the railway line at the Jazira end of the main bridge.
According to the project sources, the Padma Bridge rail link project was estimated to cost Tk 34,988.86 crore at the time of approval of the DPP in 2016. The term was set for December 2022.
But in April 2019, the cost of the project was increased by Tk 4,269.27 crore and the cost was fixed at Tk 39,258.13 crore. The ECNEC meeting also approved the proposal to extend the project till June 2024.
China Exim Bank is financing the project on a G2G basis. Of this, China's Exim Bank will provide loan assistance of about Tk 21,000 crore.
The final loan agreement was signed with China in April 2018. The remaining money would be spent from government funds. The project is being constructed by Chinese contractor CREC.
