Lalu to gift railway division to home district

Times of India, Feb 1, 2009

PATNA: Railways minister Lalu Prasad is set to gift his home district, Gopalganj in Bihar, a railway division before the next Lok Sabha polls.

After Lalu Prasad's ancestral village Phulwaria is connected with his wife and former chief minister Rabri Devi's Salar Kalan village, Lalu now plans to give another rare gift to Bihar by announcing the establishment of a railway division in Thawe at Gopalganj.

"Thawe would have a new railway division," Lalu said Saturday. He was on a visit to his native village Phulwaria and hinted that he would announce the establishment of the division in his last railway budget to be presented later in February.

According to railway officials, Lalu asked senior officials to prepare necessary ground for creation of a new railway division at Thawe in Gopalganj.

Thawe has a railway station at present and is not far from Lalu's birth place Phulwaria and his wife's birthplace Salar Kalan.

Thawe railway division will be part of the East Central Railway zone headquarters at Hajipur in Bihar.

Lalu also announced establishing of a new railway division in Bhagalpur. "Both Thawe and Bhagalpur would be headed by divisional railway managers."

During his five year term as a Railways Minister, Lalu has gifted several projects and dozens of new trains to Bihar. He recently said that the Indian Railways are investing Rs.550 billion (Rs.55,000 crore) in Bihar for execution of various railway projects to usher "a new era of development".