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Bangladesh Railway (BR) is reassessing the cost of the Padma Rail Link Project (PRLP) estimating an increase of Tk 10 billion for land acquisition (LA) to the government agencies for their land, sources said.
Besides, they said the project office will also have to acquire more land to set up a 172-kilometre rail link following a new decision to keep the provision of electric traction in it.
The steering committee on the PRLP held a meeting on the issue on Sunday and directed the project office to take approval from the member (infrastructure) of the Planning Commission so that a provision on LA with additional money can be included in the Development Project Proposal (DPP) during the revision.
Officials said the decision was needed as there was no allocation in the DPP for LA from the government agencies. The option of electric traction was also not included.
The Prime Minister recently directed the BR to set up the rail track with the option of electric traction for future scope of conversion of train services. BR has now to acquire more land to set up poles at some points.
According to the DPP, the agencies including Roads and Highways Department and Bangladesh Bridges Authority (BBA) were supposed to hand over their land to the BR.
After permission from the Planning Commission, Bangladesh Railway will seek the actual cost of land acquisition from the deputy commissioners (DCs) of the districts involved, said an official.
The project office has estimated the rough LA cost at around Tk 9.5 billion as it will now have to acquire a total of 640 acres of government and private lands.
The cost is unlikely to be final as variation is expected in the design due to introducing electric traction on the corridor. The project's Chinese contractor already placed different claims for the delay mainly attributed to not getting land in time. It had earlier sought more than a year's time further due to the delay.
The BR signed a Tk 247.49 billion commercial contract with China Railway Group Limited (CRGL) on August 08, 2016 to develop the broad gauge single railway track on both sides of the Padma Bridge, the country's longest bridge, under a government-to-government arrangement.
But the commercial contract with the CRGL, however, came into effect on July 03, 2018, due to delay in signing the loan agreement with the Chinese Exim Bank. The loan contract was signed on April 27, 2018.
The Chinese contractor had earlier sought time extension by more than a year due to the delay.
However, the contractor also failed to confirm the design of the rail track due to failure of trial piles.
An official of the project, however, said the project cost is unlikely to increase much as additional fund was kept in the DPP apart from contingency fund to meet emergency fund arrangement.