KOLKATA: The Orange Line has finally cleared the long-standing Chingrighata bottleneck, more than six years after construction at the key intersection first ran into hurdles. The last 31-metre concrete deck slab was placed on Sunday, bridging the 366-metre gap and paving the way for passenger services between New Garia and Sector V.Rail Vikas Nigam Ltd (RVNL), which is executing the 32km New Garia-Airport corridor, completed girder launching at Chingrighata in 90 days. The agency also hoisted the Tricolour atop the 12-metre-high viaduct on Saturday to mark the completion of the major construction work.“The major construction bottleneck for the Orange Line at Chingrighata has been cleared at last,” a Metro official said.Metro Railway general manager Prem Sagar Gupta recently said the railway was targeting December 31 to commission the Beleghata (Metropolitan)-IT Centre (Sector V) stretch. Once operational, the section will allow passengers to travel from New Garia to Sector V in around 30 minutes.The key breakthrough in bridging the 366-metre viaduct came over two weekends in mid-May, when concrete girders were erected across the Chingrighata crossing. Traffic was diverted through a new road built by RVNL in December 2024 to facilitate the work.However, the project had faced prolonged delays over traffic management and approvals. Kolkata Police had withheld permission for the traffic block for 15 months despite repeated requests, including interventions from the Calcutta High Court.Construction at Chingrighata had been stalled since 2020. In August that year, IIT-Kharagpur cleared the design for pier 318, which was proposed in the middle of the crossing. The Kolkata Metropolitan Development Authority (KMDA), which oversees EM Bypass, had opposed the pier because of the space it would occupy at the crucial intersection.The state government eventually issued a no-objection certificate for construction of pier 318 in May 2023. RVNL, however, remained unable to proceed with the viaduct work as it awaited a traffic block at Chingrighata from February 2, 2025.With the viaduct now completed, the Orange Line has crossed one of its most challenging construction hurdles, bringing the New Garia-Sector V passenger service closer to reality.
