India’s longest Bogibeel railroad bridge inaugurated by PM Modi

December 25: Bogibeel railroad bridge in Assam, billed as India’s longest railroad bridge was inaugurated on Tuesday by Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Its foundation was laid in 1997. The five-kilometre structure spans the waters of the mighty Brahmaputra River. Bogibeel is Asia’s second longest rail-cum-road bridge spanning 4.94 km in length, and India’s longest railroad bridge.

The Bogibeel bridge, situated 17 km downstream of Dibrugarh and Dhemaji, spans the Brahmaputra river and will connect the town of Dibrugarh in the south to Dhemaji to the river’s north. The bridge is located just over 20 km away from the Assam- Arunachal Pradesh border and is thus expected to act as an alternative to the Kolia Bhomora Setu, Tezpur in providing connectivity to nearly five million people residing in Upper Assam and Arunachal Pradesh.

The bridge, constructed at an estimated cost of Rs 5,900 crore, has a “serviceable period of around 120 years”. The bridge reduces travel time from Assam to Arunachal Pradesh to four hours and will cut out the detour of over 170 km via Tinsukia. It will also reduce Delhi to Dibrugarh train-travel time by about three hours to 34 hours as against 37 hours presently. The bridge has a two-line railway track on the lower deck and a three-lane road on the top deck. For the first time in Indian Railways, the girder has steel floor system for railway tracks and concrete for road.

The foundation of the bridge was laid in January 1997 by Prime Minister H.D.Deva Gowda but construction was inaugurated only in 2002 by Prime Minister, A.B. Vajpayee. After several years of slow progress, the Bogibeel bridge was granted a national project status by the Government of India in 2007 by Prime Minister Manmohan Sing. Accordingly, the Union Ministry of Finance funded 75% of the project costs while the Ministry of Railways has financed the rest. The design of Bogibeel bridge has 39 spans of 125 m and a superstructure of composite welded steel truss and reinforced concrete. It is designed to carry a double line 1,676 mm (5 ft 6 in) broad gauge railway on the lower deck and a 3-lane road on the upper deck.