Prime Minister Inaugurates Pune Metro

Tags: National News

Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated the 12 Km stretch of the 32.2 km Pune metro rail project on 6 March 2022. The Foundation stone of the project was laid down by the Prime Minister on December 24, 2016.

• The Rs 11,420-crore-31.25 km Pune Metro Phase 1 comprises a 16.58-km Corridor-1 from Pimpri Chinchwad to Swargate with 14 stations and a 14.66-km Corridor-2 from Vanaz to Ramwadi with 16 stations.

• Pune Metro project is a joint venture between Government of India and Maharashtra government. The project is funded through a loan of 600 million euro from European Investment Bank  and 245 million euro from AFD (French Development Agency) of France.

Mula-Mutha River Projects 

• PM Modi  also laid the foundation stone of rejuvenation and pollution abatement of Mula-Mutha river projects in Pune.

•  Rejuvenation would be done in a 9 km stretch of the river at a project cost of more than Rs 1,080 crore.

(for detail about this project kindly see  23 February 2022 post)

RK Laxman  Art Gallery 

• The Prime Minister also inaugurated the R K Laxman Art Gallery-Museum constructed at Balewadi, Pune. 

• The main attraction of the Museum is a miniature model based on the village of Malgudi which will be made alive through the audio-visual effects. Cartoons drawn by cartoonist R K Laxman will be showcased in the Museum.

• R K Laxman was a famous cartoonist who created a character of common man which was published daily in the Times of India newspaper  “You Said It” column.  

• Malgudi Days was a short story collection written by his brother R.K.Narayan, which was made into a famous TV serial on Doordarshan .

Important for Exams 

• The first metro rail system in the world was started in London on 10 January  1863 .

• First metro in India; Kolkata Metro which started its operation 24 October 1984 between Dum Dam to Tollygunge . It was started with the help of the Soviet Union . 

• Largest metro rail in operation in India : Delhi Metro (390.14 km:Source DMRC as on 7 March 2022). It started operation on 24 December 2002.

• Smallest Metro: Ahmedabad metro, 6 km;

• The metro rail systems in operation in India are in the cities of Ahmedabad, Bengaluru,Chennai, Delhi,Gurugram,Hyderabad, Jaipur,Kanpur, Kolkata, Lucknow, Mumbai,Nagpur, Noida ,Pune. (total 14 cities )