Context: Recently,  the Kerala cabinet gave the green light to begin acquiring land for SilverLine, its flagship semi high-speed railway project.

• Protests are taking place across Kerala against SilverLine, a semi high-speed railway project that envisages trains running at 200 km/h between the state’s northern and southern ends.

About Kerala’s Silver-Line Project

• Silver-Line Project is Kerala’s semi high-speed railway project that aims to reduce travel time between Kerala’s northern and southern ends.
• Distance: The railway line will be around 529 kms long, covering 11 districts through 11 stations. It will link the southern end and state capital Thiruvananthapuram with its northern end of Kasaragod.
• Implementation: The Kerala Rail Development Corporation Limited(KRDCL) will execute this project.
• KRDCL is a joint venture between the Kerala government and the Union Ministry of Railways.

Significance of the Project: Once the project is completed, one can travel from Kasaragod to Thiruvananthapuram in less than four hours on trains traveling at 200 km/hr. The current travel time on the existing Indian Railways network is 12 hours.

• Duration of the Project: The deadline for the project is 2025.

Expected Benefits of Silver-Line Project: As per Government, the silver line project will:

• reduce greenhouse gas emissions
• help in expansion of Ro-Ro services
• produce employment opportunities
• integrate airports and IT corridors and
• faster development of cities it passes through.

Present status of the Project
Land acquisition is underway

• The state government has begun the process of land acquisition after the cabinet approved it this year.
• As part of the first stage of acquisition, local revenue and K-Rail officials are on the ground, demarcating land and placing boundary stones.
• This is done to give the officials a sense of how much private land will have to be acquired and the number of families who will be displaced.

Issues with the Project

• Political rhetoric: All political parties have been spearheading separate protests.
• Huge capital requirement: They argue that the project was an “astronomical scam in the making” and would sink the state further into debt.
• Displacement of families: The project was financially unviable and would lead to the displacement of over 30,000 families.
• Ecological damage: It would cause great environmental harm as its route cuts through precious wetlands, paddy fields and hills.
• Flood hazard: The building of embankments on either side of the major portion of the line will block natural drainage and cause floods during heavy rains.
• Land Acquisition: The deadline for the project i.e. by 2025 is not realistic due to the challenging nature of land acquisition in a highly densely populated state like Kerala.
• Environment Cost: The environmentalists are opposing this project due to the potentially irreversible impact on the state’s rivers, paddy fields, and wetlands, triggering floods and landslides in the future on the proposed route.