Chingrighata Bottleneck Finally Breaks: Kolkata Metro’s Orange Line Pushes Toward Sector V Link

A six-year-old roadblock holding up a crucial stretch of Kolkata’s Orange Line has finally been cleared. The final 31-metre concrete deck slab at Chingrighata was placed on Sunday, completing the remaining 366-metre viaduct gap on the New Garia–Airport corridor. Metro officials confirmed the milestone on Tuesday.

The Chingrighata stretch had remained stalled for years because construction over the busy EM Bypass required extensive traffic restrictions. A prolonged dispute over traffic-block permissions had held up the work, with the matter reaching the Calcutta High Court and subsequently the Supreme Court. After the required clearances were secured, construction finally resumed in May 2026.

Work then progressed rapidly. RVNL, the implementing agency, completed the first 62 metres of the previously incomplete section over two weekends in May. The remaining portion was subsequently taken up, culminating in the latest placement of the 31-metre slab. The viaduct is now structurally connected across the Chingrighata bottleneck.

The latest breakthrough is a major construction milestone, but passenger trains cannot start running to Sector V yet. Track laying, electrification, signalling, testing, and other commissioning work remain to be completed. Metro authorities are currently targeting December 31, 2026, for passenger services up to the IT Centre in Salt Lake Sector V.

The Orange Line currently operates between Kavi Subhash (New Garia) and Beleghata, with the official Metro Railway portal listing the Kavi Subhash–Beleghata corridor. The Beleghata extension opened in August 2025.

There is an important caveat for commuters: Kavi Subhash’s Blue Line station is separately undergoing reconstruction following structural concerns, and Blue Line services have been curtailed to Shahid Khudiram. Therefore, the Orange Line’s existing service should not be confused with a currently functioning Blue Line–Orange Line interchange at Kavi Subhash.

The Chingrighata breakthrough does not mean every challenge on the larger Orange Line has disappeared. Earlier this month, Metro authorities also cordoned off part of a road near a cave-in site, temporarily affecting Orange Line construction work while safety measures were undertaken.

The wider project is the roughly 32-km New Garia–Airport corridor, designed to link south Kolkata with Salt Lake Sector V, New Town, and Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose International Airport. The Sector V connection is particularly significant because it would provide a faster Metro route to one of the region’s biggest IT and business hubs. Officials have estimated that a New Garia–Sector V journey could take roughly 30–40 minutes, depending on the operational configuration.

For now, the biggest takeaway is that the  long-missing piece at Chingrighata has finally been put in place. After years of stalled construction, the Orange Line has finally crossed its most notorious bottleneck. The next challenge is turning the newly connected viaduct into a fully tested passenger corridor and keeping the December 31, 2026 Sector V target on track.