a Kochi metro train during a trial run.Thiruvananthapuram: It's finalized. The much-awaited inauguration of the Kochi Metro will take place on June 17.
Prime minister Narendra Modi will inaugurate Kerala's flagship project at Aluva.
The chief minister's office received a letter Monday from the PMO confirming the arrival of Modi for the event. The date and venue for the inauguration was fixed following this.
Earlier, there was a controversy over the Kochi Metro's inauguration following uncertainty over the prime minister attending the event.
However, chief minister Pinarayi Vijayan had told the assembly that Modi would inaugurate the event.
The Rs 5,180 crore Metro is set to run 25km from Aluva to Petta, but the opening would see the train service operating 13km from Aluva to Palarivattom.
The Congress-led Oommen Chandy government had taken up the ambitious project after it was first mooted by him in 2005.
Later when the V.S. Achuthanandan government took over in 2006, the project went into a limbo, only to be put back on track by Chandy in 2011.
Work on Kochi Metro began in 2012 when then prime minister Manmohan Singh inaugurated the work on the project after the Chandy government entrusted the project to DMRC with its principal adviser E. Sreedharan overseeing it.
Chandy in 2016 flagged off the first test run of the project.
