rishikesh-karnaprayag railway link project: Vaishnaw witness breakthrough in Uttarakhand’s longest railway tunnel

Uttarakhand Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami and Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw are in the breakthrough plan for tunnel numbers T-8 and T-8M for the Rishikesh-Karnprayag Rail project.

Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw witnessed a breakthrough in India’s longest railway tunnel in Janasu, Uttarakhand on Wednesday (16 April 2025).

Accompanied by Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami, Mr Vaishnaw was about 3.5 km inside the tunnel when a boring machine broke the last layer of the rock from the other side.

The 14.57km long tunnel between Devprayag and Janasu is part of the ambitious 125km Rishikesh-Karnaprayag Broad Gauge Rail Link project in Uttarakhand.

Vaishnaw called it a historic moment because the breakthrough coincided with the railway service that began in India on April 16, 1853.

Railway Vikas Nigam Ltd. (RVNL) is taking care of the entire project, and he made the breakthrough using a German-made tunnel boring machine (TBM) called “shakti”.

Since Tunnel 8 is a double tunnel, work on another parallel tunnel is underway with the help of a second TBM, with a breakthrough expected by July. The working contractor for the tunnel is L&T.

“This extraordinary feat was achieved in the presence of Hon’ble Railway Minister Ashwini Vaishnaw, who visited the site to commemorate this important milestone in the connectivity of the Himalayan railway,” a statement from RVNL said.

Earlier, rvnl cmd pradeep gaur told pti This is the first time that TBM technology has been deployed for railway tunnels in the mountainous areas of the country. The progress has set a new global benchmark for single-screen rock TBMs with a diameter of 9.11 m.

Mr. Gower mentioned that the 9.69 m diameter Cabrera tunnel in Spain was built by a double shield TBM at an average speed of 423 m per month, while the 14.58 km tunnel between Devprayag and Janasu was just completed by a single Shield TBM at an average speed of 413 meters per month, ranking second in the world.

“This breakthrough marks an important step forward in the government’s mission to improve the connectivity of the hills in India,” Gower said.

“The Rishikesh-Karnaprayag project from concept to debug execution aims to change regional connectivity by connecting major towns such as Devprayag, Srinagar, Srinagar, Rudraprayag, Gauchar and Karnaprayag,” the statement from RVNL said.

It added: “Of courses of 125 km alignment, more than 83% of the routes pass through the tunnel, involving more than 213 km of tunnels across the main and escape routes.”

Officials attending the tunnel site said TBM faced extraordinary logistical and geological challenges, including transporting 165 tons of parts from the Mundra port to the site spanning the narrow Himalayan Road and the old bridge.

They added that the tunnel is also located in the tectonic active seismic zone IV and requires complex design and continuous progressive geological detection.

RVNL believes that once the project is completed, the project will significantly reduce travel time, improve 24/7 access to remote areas, and promote tourism and economic development in Uttarakhand.

“This is also a critical step in achieving the Char Dham Railway Connection Initiative,” the statement said.