Lumding-Badarpur Rail Link Faces Potential 6-Month Block Amid Severe Track Sinking

HAFLONG — The vital Lumding-Badarpur hill section of the Northeast Frontier Railway (NFR) is bracing for a prolonged disruption of up to six months due to severe track subsidence near the New Harangajao station.

Continuous underground water seepage and unstable soil conditions have heavily compromised a 200-metre stretch of railway tracks, making full restoration an increasingly complex engineering challenge.

Train movement on Line 1 and Line 2 has remained completely suspended for over a month to protect passenger safety. Currently, all necessary train services linking the Barak Valley, Tripura, Mizoram, and Manipur with the rest of the country are restricted to operating solely via Line 3 under tight safety monitoring.

Despite railway engineers working around the clock, approximately 1.5 to 2.5 metres of land subsidence has reoccurred along the affected stretch.

Initial attempts to backfill the sunken tracks with massive volumes of soil failed, as continuous water seepage from deeper layers repeatedly washed away the foundational earth.

The Northeast Frontier Railway (NFR) has resorted to heavy structural piling work to drain out underground water and stabilize the volatile hill slope.

Given the worsening soil mechanics brought on by active monsoon cycles in Dima Hasao, railway authorities have been unable to provide a definitive timeline for the full restoration of the primary tracks.

As a result, the NFR is actively assessing the feasibility of constructing a permanent alternative bridge option over the high-risk zone to bypass the unstable ground completely. Until then, temporary cancellations and rescheduling of key express routes—including the Guwahati–Silchar Express—remain in effect.

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