GovernmentOthersPoliticsWrong Caption

Kuthiran tunnel can not shorten 2.5 hours journey to 10 minutes as BJP leaders are claiming.

Spread the truth:

A tweet by The BJP Gujarat General Secretary has been viral on social media that the opening of one side of the Kuthiran tunnel has saved a lot of time. In the video, a vehicle is seen passing through the Kuthiran Tunnel, Wadakkanchery- Mannuthi stretch of the National Highway in Kerala. The tweet resulted in the whole argument about the time saved after the opening of one side of the tunnel. The one side of the Kuthiran tunnel had opened on 31 July 2021 after the Union Minister of Road Transport and Highways Nitin Gadkari called on to open the one side of the 1.6km twin tunnel. It is Kerala’s first-ever tunnel for road transport and South India’s Longest 6-lane road tunnel. Kuthiran gradient is situated in the Kuthiran Hills in the western part of Anaimalai Hills. The hills are a notified Wild Life Sanctuary. The stretch is from Mannuthy- Wadakkanchery of the Thrissur- Palakkad highway. The stretch is also an accident-prone area. After completion of the tunnel, the time taken would reduce since the tunnel avoids congestion. In the video, a person is seen recording the video while he is taking an exit from the tunnel. The video has been circulated on various social media platforms with a claim that the tunnel takes only 10 minutes.

Facebook

 

The viral video can be seen on various Facebook Post

 

Twitter

Ratnakar who is a State General Secretary of BJP tweeted the same video praising the central government with the caption that reads, “Coimbatore to Trichur Tunnel Opened. 2 hours Journey is now 10 Minutes. Thanks to the Govt of india’s Infrastructure development. Maybe no Media house will talk about such Good News.”

YouTube

The tweet that was shared by Ratnakar created confusion and did not specify the less time taken to bypass the old route or the time it would take from Coimbatore to Thrissur. Therefore, many users shared the tweet and the video without clarifying the truth.

WhatsApp

The same claim is viral on WhatsApp also

Truth

The claim that the Kuthiran tunnel takes 10 minute from Coimbatore to Thrissur is false. 

While searching about the distance between the Coimbatore to Thrissur with the help of the new route, that is the Kuthiran Tunnel road, the distance between Coimbatore to Thrissur is 114km while the tunnel is only 1 km long, so how is it possible to cover 114km in just 10 minutes.


According to Google maps, the tunnel route shows that it would take approximately 2 minutes to cover 2.1 km without traffic. Also, on the non-tunnel route, without traffic, it would take approximately 5 minutes to cover 2.8km.

 

 

We also found some Twitter posts stating that there used to be a lot of traffic before the tunnel was made because of the huge congestion and hoping that the new tunnel would reduce the time taken.

Also, according to the reports, there have been various incidents of congestion that resulted in several hours of traffic as vehicles navigated the Kuthiran hill before the tunnel was made operational. We found a report by On Manorama with the headline One section of Kuthiran tunnel opened; travel time a mere one minute now.

According to this report, The left tunnel towards the Thrissur side was thrown open to traffic without a formal inaugural ceremony by the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) around 5 pm based on the instructions of the Union Minister for Surface Transport Nitin Gadkari. While vehicles were earlier trapped in traffic blocks lasting several hours in the Kuthiran hill, they can now cover the distance in less than one minute through the tunnel underneath,” reported On Manorama.

Therefore, the tweet about the distance of 114km covered from Coimbatore to Thrissur in 10 minutes is not proven. The Kuthiran tunnel has helped the citizens with less congestion and more smooth flow but it did not specify the timings.

 

 


Spread the truth:

Shriya Handoo

MA- Journalism student at Symbiosis Institute of Media and Communications.