Punjab and Himachal will sign an MoU Friday to begin construction of the long-delayed ropeway, which is likely to boost tourism.
Chandigarh: After a six-year wait, Punjab and Himachal Pradesh are set to sign an agreement to construct a ropeway between two significant religious spots — Anandpur Sahib and Naina Devi.
Anandpur Sahib is where the tenth Sikh guru, Gobind Singh, founded the Khalsa Panth in 1699. Sri Naina Devi is a significant Hindu temple, located where the eyes of Lord Shiva’s consort Sati are supposed to have fallen when her flaming body was cut into 51 pieces by Vishnu’s chakra.
The Punjab cabinet approved the project last week after receiving the approved Memorandum of Understanding from Himachal. The final MoU will be signed by the two states Friday.
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The proposed ropeway will be 3.75 km long, of which just 274 m will fall in Punjab. Currently, the road distance between the two sites is about 20 km, which takes over an hour to cover by bus.
Stop-start journey
The project, conceived in 2012, has been revived under Jairam Thakur’s BJP government in Himachal, because the CM has taken a keen interest in pushing ropeway projects to maximise his state’s tourism potential.
The states had signed an MoU to execute the project in July 2012, and Punjab had also acquired the land required to set up a lower terminal and right of way within its territory. But when the Congress came to power under Virbhadra Singh in Himachal in 2012, it shelved the project. The MoU was cancelled in June 2014.
The BJP came back to power in December last year with Thakur at the helm, and in February 2018, he wrote to Punjab CM Captain Amarinder Singh to revive the project; the latter promptly agreed.
Executing the project
The project is now proposed to be carried out in public-private partnership mode by setting up a Special Purpose Vehicle.
The total paid up equity of the SPV will be Rs 1 crore. This will be shared equally by the states, as will the revenue, with a concession period of 40 years. The project will be completed in three years.
Himachal ropeways
Himachal Pradesh already has four operational ropeways: Solang, Parwanoo, Shimla Mall Road to Jakhal, and one within the Naina Devi temple complex.
Several other ropeway projects are being constructed and CM Thakur reviewed them Monday. He was informed that the Dharamsala-McLeodganj ropeway will be completed by June 2019, while another inside the Baglamukhi temple complex in Kangra will be completed by the end of next year.
The Palchan to Rohtang ropeway is expected to be complete by 2022, with a part of it becoming operational in 2020. Work on the Adi Himani to Chamunda and Tutikandi to Shimla Mall Road ropeways is expected to begin next year, while the construction of the Bhunter to Bijli Mahadev ropeway is also likely to begin soon.
“Apart from these, by the end of this year, the state will have at least half a dozen ropeway sites to be developed by private players. These include the Palampur (Neugal), Janjheli to Shikari Devi, and Shahtalai to Deotsidh projects,” said Rakesh Kanwar, Himachal’s director of tourism.
Changes in policy
Kanwar said the government had brought in some changes in the state ropeway policy to facilitate those interested in setting up projects.
“First, in the new policy, the concessionaire begins to pay the government after seven years of the project starting commercially. During this period, the concessionaire can return loans to banks etc,” he said.
“Second, all the clearances for the project, apart from the forest department, would be done with government’s nodal officer handholding the concessionaire.
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“Third, instead of two public hearings for assessment of environment impact, a single hearing would be done.
“And finally, securities which have to be advanced by the concessionaire have been reduced.”