NFR making efforts to promote Jatinga Safari

Guwahati, Apr 30 (UNI) The Northeast Frontier Railway (NFR) is making all efforts to revive and promote the Jatinga Safari to attract tourists across the world.

Jatinga safari is being run on the century-old meter-gauge track that runs parallel to the under construction broad gauge track on Lumding-Badarpur section.

The meter gauge track was constructed in 1892 under the supervision of engineer John Buyers whose team took ten years to complete the project that linked up Brahmaputra and Barak river valleys in Asom through Lumding-Badarpur hill section of the railway.

The NFR set the ball rolling for Jatinga Safari in 2003 with approval from the Railway Board, but since then only three batches of foreign tourists have undertaken the joyride. Obviously, the railways need to hard sell the venture to make it popular.

According to an official source, at least 20 tourists in a batch are required to run the Jatiga safari. The tour operators frequently enquire about it but there are hardly enough tourists to make it a regular safari.

The NFR is also not being able to make profits at the desired level from its popular venture to exploit picturesque hill sections in Darjeeling Himalayas in West Bengal.

A source in the NFR headquarter here informed that the railway is not earning any profit from its popular safaris on heritage steam locomotives in the picture-perfect Darjeeling Himalayas section notwithstanding the immense popularity of the steam locos among the tourists.

The reason cited is the fare structure is not in tune with high-cost of running and maintenance of age-old steam locomotives that have been converted to museum pieces in rest of the world.

The heartening aspect is that there is no dearth of tourists especially those from European countries willing to go on a joy ride by the steam locomotive along the narrow gauge that snakes through the scenic Darjeeling Himalayas. But the fare structure needs to be revised to make it a profitable proposition for the railway.

The fare structure is considered low in Siliguri-Darjeeling section while the NFR is earning handsome profit in Ghum-Darjeeling section where the steam loco is run occasionally when there is sufficient number of tourists.

UNI