What are the human costs of building a railway link in one of Indias most restive regions?
To begin with, 36 people – railway workers and security forces guarding the tracks – died in some 28 rebel attacks during work to link the north-eastern city of Agartala in Tripura state to the rest of the country. That’s not all. A total of 67 people connected with work on the rail link were kidnapped by the rebels. Only 19 were freed after ransom payouts. The fate of the rest is still unknown. On top of all that, a raging tribal insurgency in Tripura has ensured that the $186m, 109km-long (68-mile) link took 15 years to build. But by the end of June, the link will be complete and Agartala will become the second state capital of north-east India – after Assam’s capital, Guwahati – to find a place on India’s railway map. Big network Trains first reached Tripura in 1964 when the railway was extended to the state’s northern business hub, Dharmanagar. Later it was extended further to Kumarghat. “But it has taken more than 40 years since then to connect Agartala by rail,” said Tripura Chie
