Guntur division

Guntur Division is one of the six divisions of South Central Railway (SCR), a zone of the Indian Railways. SCR has its head quarters at Secunderabad, Andhra Pradesh and serves almost the whole of the state of Andhra Pradesh, a large part of Maharashtra along with small portions of Madhya Pradesh, Karnataka and Tamil Nadu. The headquarters of the division are located at Rail Vikas Bhavan, Pattabhipuram, Guntur. .

Overview

This is one of the recently formed divisions of Indian Railways. The Railway Board announced its creation in 1997 to serve the impoverished interior Coastal Andhra region, the eastern part of the backward Rayalaseema region and the south eastern extremities of the Telangana region of Andhra Pradesh. An Officer-on-Special Duty (OSD) was consequently posted in Guntur. It became fully functional on 1st April, 2003 with P.N Shukla as its first Divisional Railway Manager.

The newly built divisional headquarters office, Rail Vikas Bhavan at Pattabhipuram in Guntur is a landmark structure in the city, having a semi-circular design and mostly covered by tinted glass. The current Divisional Railway Manager is M. Akhtar, an officer of the IRPS cadre.

Performance and Earnings

Since its inception the division has improved its earnings every year, especially with its Freight/Goods services cite web|url=http://www.hindu.com/2006/04/26/stories/2006042605670200.htm|title=Guntur Railway division earnings|work=Online edition of the Hindu|accessdate=2007-08-27] . A major part of the freight traffic consists of cement, food grains, chilly, cotton husk and timber. The passenger traffic too has been steadily picking up. The division, which had total earnings of Rs 0.93 billion at the time of its formation in 2003, earned Rs 2.73 billion in the financial year 2007-08, a close to three fold increase since its inception. Passenger earnings accounted for about Rs 0.6 billion of the total. Freight loading was to the tune of 2.81 Million Tonnes. It is thus the 4th highest earning division of South Central Railway and has the best operating ratio in the zone of about 33. The division was awarded the Accounts Shield for excellence in the 53rd Railway Week Celebrations of SCR. [ [http://www.hindu.com/2008/04/17/stories/2008041759530200.htm The Hindu : Andhra Pradesh / Guntur News : Railway division nets profit ] ]

The major freight loading points are:

* M/S India Cements Ltd., Vishnupuram.
* M/S Penna Cements Ltd., Vishnupuram and Miryalaguda.
* Rice : Miryalaguda and Nalgonda.
* Foodgrains, Cotton husk, chillies: Reddipalem.

Jurisdiction

The division is located completely in Andhra Pradesh and covers the districts of Nalgonda, Guntur, Kurnool and Prakasam. It was formed by merging the most far-flung and least productive stretches of Vijayawada, Secunderabad and Guntakal divisions of the South Central Railway. It has 67 major and minor stations spread over a total route length of 618.8 kilometres. Their category wise breakup is

A "(Annual revenue above Rs 60 million)": Guntur Junction (1)

B "(Annual revenue between Rs 30 to 60 million)": Nadikudi, Nandyal and Nalgonda (3)

C: No stations

D: 8 stations

E: 37 stations

F: "(Halt Stations)": 18 stations

The division is completely Broad Gauge.

About 17 pairs of Express trains and 26 pairs of ordinary passenger trains operate through the division. The route breakup is as follows

Brief History

The Krishna Canal-Nandyal (KCC-NDL) stretch was a part of the important East-West coast link that connected Margao in Goa to Masulipatnam in the erstwhile Madras Province of British India. It was originally built to Metre Gauge by the Southern Mahratta Railways (later the Madras and Southern Mahratta Railways-MSMR) during 1885-1890. The track passed through the Nallamalla Ranges and as a result quite a few major engineering works were undertaken in the course of the railroad construction, the most impressive of them being the massive Dorabavi Viaduct and the Bogada Tunnel, both of them about 30 km from Nandyal. A branch line to the coastal town of Repalle, about 60 km east of Guntur was built by the same company in the 1910s. This line connected to the main line of the East Coast Railway at Tenali. Both these sections were converted to Broad Gauge during 1993-95 under Indian Railways' Project Unigauge. The gauge conversion was a difficult task owing to the uneven terrain. The old alignment between Gazulapalli and Diguvametta was abandoned and a new Bogada tunnel, about 1.6 km in length and a new Dorabavi Viaduct located at a much lower altitude were constructed at a huge expense.

The Guntur-Macherla (GNT-MCLA) section was built in the 1930s by MSMR to serve the backward inner Telangana region. It too was originally Metre Gauge and was converted to Broad Gauge in 1992-93. This section was used for the transport of limestone, quartz &c, primarily from Piduguralla, popularly known as the Lime City.

The foundation stone for the 152 km long Bibinagar-Nadikudi rail project that opened an alternative route to Secunderabad from Vijayawada and connected the interior of Telangana to Hyderabad was laid by the then Prime Minister of India, Indira Gandhi on 7th April, 1974. The project was finally finished in 1989 and the line commissioned a year later. Two major bridges to span the River Krishna and Musi are located in this section. It is used by many south/east bound trains in a bid to decongest the heavily used Warangal-Vijayawada line. Cement is an important commodity that is transported through this line.

Abandoned lines

* The 10 km long Vejendla-Tsunduru stretch that connected to the Chennai-Howrah mainline.

* The 27 km long stretch that was built to carry building material to the Nagarjuna Sagar dam site from Macherla.

* The 7.8 km long stretch of metre gauge line from Pattabhipuram, Guntur to Bandarupalle.

Towns

The major towns served by the division on the Pagidipalli-Repalle route are Nalgonda, Miryalaguda, Nadikudi, Sattenapalle, Piduguralla, Tenali, Repalle. On the Nandyal stretch, the major towns are Donakonda, Cumbum, Narasaraopet, Giddalur and Nandyal.

Places of Interest served by the Division

* Mangalagiri - Located on the Guntur-Vijayawada route, Mangalagiri is the site of a renowned Hindu temple and is famous for its handloom industry.

* Nagarjuna sagar - 29 km away from Macherla station, Nagarjunasagar is a huge artificial lake created by the construction of a dam and hydel power station on the River Krishna. The submerged valley was also the site of the Ancient Krishna River Valley civilization that flourished in the Later Buddhist period. A 2000 year old stupa and the remains of a university are among the relics that now lie underwater. However the recoverable relics were rescued and are now displayed at the Archaeological Museum in Nagarjunakonda, an island in the lake. Also nearby are the well known Ethipothala Falls, one of the largest in India.

* Amaravati - 30 km from Guntur, Amaravati was the capital of the Satavahanas, a powerful dynasty that ruled modern Andhra Pradesh and Maharashtra for 500 years after the fall of the Mauryan Empire. It is also the site of a famous Shiva Temple and the ruins of the Amaravati Stupa, panels of which are now found in the Tokyo and London museums.

* Mahanandi - About 16 km from Nandyal is Mahanandi, one of the most popular shrines in Andhra Pradesh. Nestled in the Nallamalla Hills, Mahanandi is famous for the Mahanandiswara Swamy Temple, dedicated to Lord Shiva. It is one of the Navanandis. A unique feature of the shrine is that one is allowed to touch the linga present in the Garbha-griha.

* Macherla - 131 km from Guntur, Macherla is the terminus of the Nadikudi-Macherla line and the nearest railhead for Nagarjuna Sagar. It is also the site of a famous 13th Century temple dedicated to Sri Laxmi Chennakesava Swamy.

* Uppalapadu Bird Sanctuary - 5 km away from Guntur. It is the site of a wetland that hosts a large variety of both local and migratory birds year long.

* Cumbum - Cumbum lake in present Prakasham district of AP, built on Gundalakamma rivulet is one of the oldest man made lakes of Asia. The lake is around 7 km in length and about 3 km average in breadth. It is said that the lake was built by Sage Jamadagni who joined an opening between two hills of Nallamalai range. But history records that the anicut was built by the Gajapati kings of Orissa in 15th. Century AD when the area was under their control. It was subsequently renovated by the Vijayanagar princess Varadharajamma. At the turn of 20th century the height of the dam was 57 feet and the drainage area was 430 sq miles. The direct irrigation land was about 10,300 acres in all. It is one of the most picturesque valley in the Guntur-Nandyal section . [ [http://dsal.uchicago.edu/reference/gazetteer/pager.html?objectid=DS405.1.I34_V11_080.gif. "Imperial Gazetteer of India,1901"] ]

* Bhattiprolu - About 28 km from Tenali on the Repalle line, Bhattiprolu was one of the earliest sites of Pre-Mauryan Buddhism in South India. A phrase written on a piece of pottery, excavated from the Stupa there is the earliest example of Brahmi script in South India, dating back to 4th Century BC. It is thus the site from where Tamil and Telugu script evolved.

Miscellaneous information

* The division has 386 level crossing gates in its jurisdiction. It maintains 6 telephone exchanges and runs 4 hospitals/health units.

* There are a total of 37 officers in the division and its sanctioned staff strength is 4618.

* A new residential colony, Rail Vihar has been built at Nallapadu about 5 km from the city for the officers and staff of the division.

* As part of its greenery efforts, the division maintains a 50 acre park called Kartik Vanam which has more than 30 varieties of trees, both native and exotic, near Nallapadu. The park has around 6,500 neem, jamun, amla, guava, kharanj, teak and many other varieties of trees. It also has a duck park in it.

* Some of the popular trains passing through the division are the Falaknuma Express, the Amaravati Express and the Chennai Express.

Current projects

* Shifting Reddipalem Goods Yard to make way for New Guntur Railway Station which will be a bypass for north bound trains.
* The doubling and electrification of Tenali-Guntur and the electrification of Guntur- Nandyal- Guntakal are proposed for Railway Board's approval.

* A new line from Vishnupuram to Janapahad has also been sanctioned for the benefit of Cement industries which may ultimately be connected to Jaggayapet

* A new line from Nandyal to Yerraguntla to enable more cement loading.

* Converting many stations in the division to standard layout stations in order to provide crossing facilities there.

* Establishing a new self sufficient modern railway colony at Rail Vihar,in the foothills near Nallapadu,Guntur-522005 for the officers and staff of Guntur Railway Division and eventually developing it as a satellite town ship of Guntur.

See also

* Train Transit in Guntur
* Guntur City
* Indian Railways
* South Central Railway

References

* [http://www.fallingrain.com/world/IN/2/Guntur.html FallingRain Map - elevation = 32m]