Jaipur : More than 90 percent of the railway lines in Rajasthan have been electrified. Even after that, the railways are not able to run all the trains and goods trains with electric engines. The situation is such that even after spending crores of rupees on electrification, the trains are still spreading smoke. The reason for this is said to be a dispute between the state government and the railways regarding the supply of electricity. Actually, traction sub-stations (TPSS) have been built on electric traction in the North Western Railway Zone. Their job is to take electricity from the 132 kV electric grid and convert it into 25 thousand kV for the operation of trains. For this, the state government was providing electricity to the railways under open access at concessional rates, but now the government has put a hindrance in it. It is being told that the government had put a condition to give electricity to the railways on consumer mode instead of concessional rates, but the railways refused to accept it. Because according to the new rates, it has to pay 2 to 3 rupees more per unit for power supply.
The Railway Board intervened in this matter and wrote a letter to the state CS for a solution. Recently, in a meeting with Chief Minister Bhajan Lal Sharma, the officials also promised help, but still the solution could not be found. It is being told that this matter has reached the Supreme Court. To ensure that the work of the railways is not affected till the decision is taken, the board directed the zonal railways to take electricity connections at the rates as per the government’s condition. After which connections have been taken at some places.
3 thousand crore electricity units are required annually
So far, electrification work of more than 90 percent of the 5500 km railway track in the zone has been completed. Out of 550 trains, only about 200 trains are running on electric engines. These require 3 thousand crore units of electricity annually. In such a situation, now the operation of trains with electric engines is not being started on many routes including Bikaner to Suratgarh, Jaipur via Merta, Jodhpur, Suratgarh to Anupgarh-Sriganganagar, Hanumangarh, because the sub-stations built on traction are not getting charged. An additional 50 lakh units of electricity will be required for these. In such a situation, according to the new charge, the railways will have to bear an additional burden of about 1.5 crore rupees. The railways are confused about this.
