Darjeeling rail revamp to help restore lost glory

Jayanta Gupta | TNN | Mar 5, 2018, Kolkata: Indian Railways will ensure that Darjeeling Himalayan Railways is not only restored to its original glory but also adds new rolling stock to make it more attractive to tourists.

This was announced by Railway Board chairman Ashwani Lohani in Kolkata on Sunday. The board has also decided to preserve the old Jubilee Bridge and turn it into a tourist attraction. It had earlier been decided to sell off the structure as scrap.

“I was involved when DHR was declared a Unesco World Heritage site and shall visit it later this month. We have made plans to restore things to their original status. There is a lot of emphasis on DHR and we will restore the old workshop, add more steam locomotives and exotic rolling stock that will be tourist-friendly,” he said.

DHR services were truncated after landslides and derailments over the last several years. In 2017, amid efforts to restore the heritage narrow-gauge hill railways to its original status, the Gorkhaland movement disrupted things. Demonstrators damaged stations at Ghum and Sonada, resulting in tremendous resentment among heritage activists. Later, there was talk of whether Unesco would withdraw its heritage tag.

The Jubilee Bridge across the Hooghly between Bandel and Naihati was completed in 1885, the 50th year of Queen Victoria’s reign, and decommissioned by Eastern Railway in 2016. It was the first to connect the eastern and western banks of the river and was unique in its design. Engineers used pendulum bearings that are still an attraction for railway engineers from across the world.

“Many people still come to see the bearings and the structure. We plan to set up interpretation boards that will inform people of the bridge’s significance. Its historical and technical backgrounds will be detailed on the boards,” Lohani added.