The impasse over construction of East-West Metro Railway was resolved after Mayor Sovan Chatterjee assured Kolkata Metro Rail Corporation Limited (KMRCL) of all available support and cooperation.
A high-level meeting was held on Friday afternoon between senior officials of KMRCL, Kolkata Municipal Corporation (KMC) and the state Transport department. It was presided over by Mayor Sovan Chatterjee. Alapan Bandyopadhyay, Principal Secretary and Anindya Karfarma, Director General (Building) along with senior KMRCL officials were present at the meeting.
The problem cropped up over nine old buildings on Brabourne Road. Most of them are over a century old. It was found that these buildings might be affected due to East West metro construction particularly when the construction started on the land after completion of the tunnel under river Hooghly. The KMRCL authorities got in touch with KMC and sought its opinion.
Chatterjee, on Friday, assured the KMRCL authorities not to panic and in turn, KMRCL officials agreed to bear all the expenditure to repair the cracks or damages that might occur to these houses during construction of the metro rail. Moreover, it will bear the expenditure if the residents of those buildings need to be shifted to facilitate construction for a short period which may vary between seven days to two weeks.
Chatterjee said representatives of all the agencies who were present during the meeting assured full cooperation in view of the massive work that has been taken up for better traffic management in the city.
"To facilitate such a big construction operation, we will all cooperate with KMRCL so that the project is completed on time," Chatterjee said.
KMRCL officials said as the problem had been resolved; construction of East-West Metro will be now carried out at a faster pace.
It may be mentioned that KMRCL is yet to get clearance from Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) over the construction of the metro corridor in BBD Bag.
ASI will study the impact of the construction on old Currency Building and Synagogue temple along with another old construction.