DMK Rajya Sabha member Tiruchy Siva helps from MPs’ fund

Tiruchy: The DMK Rajya Sabha member Tiruchy Siva has extended a helping hand to construct an escalator at the railway junction here with funds from the ‘Local area MP development Fund’.

Mr Siva has earmarked Rs One crore from the fund to put up the escalator, which would be of particular help to the elderly and women passengers, besides children and patients travelling by rail.

Inspecting the ongoing earthwork for the escalator work on Monday, Mr Siva told reporters after discussions with A.K. Agarwal, the Divisional railway manager, Tiruchy, and other officials that he was moved by the plight of elderly people, women and children whenever he visited the railway station here. “I find them suffering in reaching platforms two and three where most trains passing through Tiruchy stop,” said Siva. Following this, he asked the railway officials to work out an estimate for an escalator and they had told him that the project would need about Rs 92 lakh. Hence, he sanctioned Rs One crore from his local area MP development fund, Siva noted.

When newsmen drew his attention to the long pending request for operating a day express train between Tiruchirappalli and Bengaluru and the railway’s reduction of seat quota in the Mayiladuthurai- Coimbatore Jan Shatabdi express train for Tiruchirapalli, Mr Siva assured that he would take up these two issues with the Railways minister shortly for a suitable remedy.

Agarwal said that the escalator will be ready for public use by October this year. Initially, it will be made available for platforms number two and three, and subsequently extended to other platforms also, depending upon the availability of money. A foot over-bridge connecting all seven platforms at a cost of Rs Eight crores is also on the cards, Agarwal added.