Rail line to Port Blair on anvil

As a part of an ambitious plan to build 240-km broad-gauge railway line connecting two major islands, with bridges and stations along the coast connecting Port Blair with Diglipur on the Andaman and Nicobar Islands, will be built on the fast-tracked basis. The Railway Ministry is set to approve the project bringing the archipelago on the rail map connecting the Union Territory's capital city in the south with the largest town on the north Andaman island, currently linked by a 350 km bus service that takes over 14 hours and a ship that takes around 24 hours. With no air connectivity to the area and giving a fillip to the rail link, the Union Territory administration has agreed to share 50% of the project's operational cost. As soon as the line is commissioned, tourism will see a quantum jump from the current 4.5 lakh visitors to around 6 lakh a year, said official sources.