Modi in Bengaluru today: Pink Line ride, Vande Bharat flag-off and ₹15,600 crore of projects, then Mysuru planetarium

Prime Minister Narendra Modi is in Karnataka on Friday, November 13, for a four-stop day in Bengaluru and Mysuru that centres on projects worth over ₹15,600 crore, a ride on the new Pink Line of Namma Metro and the flag-off of a Vande Bharat Express to the coast. The Prime Minister’s Office schedule puts the first event at about 10:45 am and the last at about 3:30 pm. The tour then moves to Gujarat on Saturday.

The day, hour by hour

At about 10:45 am Modi attends the Golden Jubilee celebrations of Prashanti Kutiram in Bengaluru, the campus of the S-VYASA yoga university, and addresses the gathering. He will lay the foundation stone of the Golden Jubilee Administrative Block and launch the S-VYASA off-campus at Thiruvananthapuram in Kerala. The celebrations run from November 13 to 23 under the theme “Towards Viksit Bharat 2047” and also mark the birth centenary of H V Sheshadri, born in Bengaluru in 1926, who was the RSS Sarkaryavah from 1987 to 2000.

At about 12:45 pm he flags off the metro and rides from Tavarekere to IIM Bangalore station. At about 1:15 pm he lays foundation stones and inaugurates or dedicates the ₹15,600 crore of projects, and addresses a public gathering. At about 3:30 pm he inaugurates the COSMOS-Mysuru Planetarium in Mysuru and addresses the gathering there.

What the release lists

Metro. The Pink Line section between Kalena Agrahara and Tavarekere, costing about ₹3,470 crore, is the single largest transport item.

Power. The Renewable Energy Zones transmission scheme (Phase-II) at Koppal-II and Gadag-II, about ₹4,450 crore, is to be inaugurated; it lets about 2 GW be carried out. So is the Bidar solar energy zone scheme, about ₹1,370 crore, with a pooling station and capacity to carry 2.5 GW of solar power. Foundation stones go down for a Davanagere, Chitradurga and Ballari scheme (over ₹3,450 crore) and a Davanagere and Ballari strengthening project (over ₹1,100 crore).

Fuel and gas. Modi dedicates India’s largest underground LPG storage cavern, at Mangaluru, built for over ₹850 crore with a capacity of 80,000 metric tonnes and a 9.4 km pipeline from New Mangalore Port to the main terminal. He also dedicates MRPL’s ₹330 crore Devangonthi Marketing Terminal in Bengaluru, and lays the foundation stone of a GAIL compressed biogas plant at Haralakunte that will process about 300 tonnes of municipal solid waste a day into 12.6 tonnes of biogas.

Railways. The Bengaluru-Mangaluru-Madgaon Vande Bharat Express is flagged off, serving Hassan, Sakleshpur, Mangaluru, Udupi, Murdeshwar, Gokarna, Karwar and Madgaon. Four redeveloped Amrit Bharat stations open: Chamarajanagar, Chikkamagaluru, Sakleshpur and Subrahmanya Road. The 45 km Bagalkot-Wandal doubling, part of the 284 km Gadag-Hotgi project that also supports coal supply to the Kudgi NTPC plant, is dedicated, along with electrification of the 55 km Sakleshpur-Subrahmanya Road ghat section, which completes electrification of the Bengaluru-Mangaluru route.

Largest items in the ₹15,600 crore package

• ₹4,450 crKoppal-II and Gadag-II transmission, about 2 GW
• ₹3,470 crPink Line, Kalena Agrahara to Tavarekere
• ₹3,450 cr+Davanagere, Chitradurga and Ballari transmission
• ₹1,370 crBidar solar transmission, 2.5 GW

The Mysuru planetarium

The COSMOS-Mysuru Planetarium, built by the Indian Institute of Astrophysics on the University of Mysore campus at the foothills of Chamundi Hills, is described as India’s first LED dome planetarium. Its 15-metre tilted dome has about 6,150 panels and 4.2 crore LEDs that can be controlled in real time. The Sky Theatre will run astronomy programmes in Kannada, English and Hindi, and an in-house film on the history and astronomy of Mysuru. The site also has exhibition halls, a museum, a lecture hall and a training centre.

How we got here

The visit was announced in the release of November 11, and our first report set out the full list. Karnataka’s government has been preparing for it in public. On Thursday, Chief Minister D K Shivakumar told reporters in Bengaluru that the state would welcome the Prime Minister respectfully, and added: “We will certainly raise the issues.” Asked whether he would seek drought relief and funds, he said “Definitely”, but would not give details. He said Modi had asked him to come to Delhi for the private meeting he had sought; no date has been given. Our report on those remarks has the demands already sent to the Centre, from a Bengaluru package to irrigation clearances and the sugar minimum selling price.

The day before, at the Bharat Agriculture Conference in Delhi on Thursday, Modi urged farmers to cut chemical use, as set out in our report on natural farming.

Why it matters

For readers in the coastal and ghat districts, the finished electrification of the Bengaluru-Mangaluru line and a Vande Bharat service through Hassan, Sakleshpur, Mangaluru, Udupi and Karwar to Madgaon change what the route can offer. In Bengaluru, the Pink Line stretch from Kalena Agrahara to Tavarekere adds to the metro network. The two transmission schemes being inaugurated carry about 4.5 GW of renewable power out of Koppal, Gadag and Bidar, and two more are at the foundation-stone stage. The Mangaluru cavern adds 80,000 tonnes of LPG storage.

The release carries no direct quotations from the Prime Minister or any official. What Modi says at the three addresses today is not yet known.

What happens next

The Karnataka leg ends in Mysuru this afternoon. The tour continues in Gujarat on Saturday, November 14, a temple visit according to the announcement, for which the release gives no timings. His next announced engagement abroad is the ASEAN-India summit in Manila from November 16 to 18, covered in our report. Shivakumar’s Delhi meeting with Modi has no date yet.