Karnataka legislator now owns a railway line

After owning helicopters, miners-turned-politicians of Karnataka have begun having their own railway tracks.

Suspended BJP MLC G Janardhan Reddy, who almost derailed the JD (S)-BJP coalition Government a couple of months ago by accusing Chief Minister H D Kumaraswamy of accepting a bribe of Rs 1.5 billion, has become the first miner-turned-politician in Karnataka to own a railway track.

On Sunday, Reddy himself inaugurated a seven-kilometer railway track from his iron ore mining site near Bellary to Obalapuram railway station in Andhra Pradesh. The railway track laid at a cost of Rs 120 million will help Reddy transport iron ore in much shorter time and at a more economical rate.

Karnataka’s Tourism Minister B Sriramulu, Bellary MP G Karunakar Reddy and a couple of Railway officials were present when a train made its maiden journey on the private railway track laid by the BJP MLC.

Janaradhran Reddy, who has mining contracts on vast tracts of land in Bellary, along the Andhra Pradesh border, will hire trains from the Indian Railways to transport iron ore. Reddy’s firm - Obalapuram Mining Company - will require at least 112 wagons with a capacity of 45 tonnes each, daily to transport the iron ore, according to officials.

Till now, the iron ore was being transported from his mining site to Bellary railway station by road. About 600 lorries used to play between the mining site to Bellary railway railway station daily. The new railway track is expected to considerably reduce the burden on the vehicular traffic along the route.

Reddy now joins the league of two other private miners in Karnataka, who already have their own railway tracks.

Reddy’s acquisition comes after a fellow legislator from Bellary Anil Lad, a first-time MLA from BJP, became the youngest owner of Bell helicopter in India. Anil Lad, who also runs a flourishing mining business, had paid a whopping Rs 115 million for the chopper and employed a pilot by paying him Rs 150,000 to fly him around.