A four and a half kilometre long tunnel will be built to connect the Doda district of the division with Himachal directly. National Highway Infrastructure Development Corporation Limited (NHIDCL) is preparing the DPR for the road project from the Thathri subdivision to the Chamba district of Himachal.
In this project, the tunnel is to be constructed from Kalujugasar at Gandoh in Doda, which will connect the Makkan and Titul villages of Teesa tehsil in Himachal. With the tunnel’s construction, the distance from Thathri in Doda to Chamba will be 70 km, whose journey will be covered in just two hours.
The local people will also benefit in a big way from this strategically important road project. Himachal has a kinship of about 1.5 lakh population in Doda. The people of Himachal Pradesh and the people of Himachal have to come to Doda from here. In such a situation, they have to go to Jammu first from Doda and then to Himachal from there. With the construction of the road, the shortest distance connectivity between Doda and Himachal will be made to date.
An official said that with the construction of the road project, the total cost of movement between Doda and Himachal would be reduced to Rs 500. Presently there is a single lane road from Thathri to Gandoh-Kalujugasar. Beyond this, the road ends. Due to the formation of a four and a half kilometre long tunnel from the bottom of the mountain, this area will be directly connected to two villages of Sanwal Gram Panchayat of Chamba in Himachal.
The existing single-lane road with a tunnel will be a double lane. The official said that the proposal for the project was sent in 2018. Recently, Union Minister Dr Jitendra Singh has ordered to prepare DPR.
Doda district has beautiful natural scenery, but tourism is not being developed due to inter-state road connectivity. With the construction of a double lane road with Kaljugasar Tunnel, tourists will come directly to Doda from Himachal. It will also be easy to go to Kashmir from here. In this way, the tourism of the area will get a boost.
“The DPR of Thathri to Chamba road and tunnel project is in the final stage. There is vigorous exercise going on in this regard. After the official approval, the report will also be prepared for land acquisition”, Col NS Gill, General Manager NHDCL.
