Northeast Frontier Railway carries out eviction drive in Doomdooma

A CORRESPONDENT

DOOMDOOMA: In an eviction drive carried out by Northeast Frontier Railway (NFR), Tinsukia Division against the illegal encroachment in between Hansara and Doomdooma Railway Stations, three houses were reportedly demolished by the personnel of its Engineering department with the help of district administration and local police.

It is mentionable that Makum-Saikhowa (Sadiya) Ralphath Surakhya Samity (MSRSS), an NGO dedicated for the development of Railways in this region which is strategically important, many memoranda were submitted to the Divisional Railway Manager (DRM), Tinsukia Division from time to time during last two decades.

But the Railway authority paid scant regards to protect its own property inspite of the repeated entreaties by the MSRSS in its aforesaid memoranda. In between Makum to Dangri, all the Railway Stations except Makum Junction were closed down during gauge conversion work under L - D ( Lumding - Dibrugarh) project in the beginning of this century. Even after running of a passenger train 55911 Up/55912 Dn Dangri Passenger in between Tinsukia to Dangri from October 30, 2002, the six railway stations i.e. Barhapjan, Hansara, Doomdooma, Rupaisiding, Talap and Dangri on its entire route were not reopened. Of these two stations namely, Doomdooma and Talap were assured to be reopened during the gauge conversion work by the then Deputy General Manager (G) in its letter dated July 8, 1990 to the president of MSRSS.

As a consequence, there has been large scale encroachments on the station campuses of all these stations as well as along the railway tracks as there are nobody to look after and upkeep of the stations. As is evident, without a nexus between a section of unscrupulous and corrupted officials and employees of the Railways and the Police personnel especially, the GRP (Government Reserve Police) and RPF(Railway Protection Force), the encroachers would not have dared so much to illegally occupy the Railway lands. Things came to such a pass that in a meeting of the DRUCC (Divisional Railway Users' Consultative Committee), Tinsukia Division wrong data was placed before a MP nominated member with regard to an illegally occupied quarter of Railways to be made encroachment free.

When pointed out the mistake by the member under reference in the meeting, the concerned officials assured to look after the matter. But the funniest part is that the said quarter is under illegal occupation of an outsider till date. The Secretary, Makum-Saikhowa (Sadiya) Ralpath Surakhya Samity, Dhiren Deka in a statement to the press while lauding this step of the Railways, demanded the Railway authority to undertake a massive eviction drive in its entire Makum-Dangri route to make it encroachment free and urged them to take steps for reopening of the all six stations phase-wise and run the passenger/DEMU train that was withdrawn in the wake of COVID pandemic for the convenience of the commuters of this vast region.

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