77km, 56 stops: Magenta Line to overtake Pink as Delhi Metro's longest corridor; 31 underground stations

NEW DELHI: The Magenta Line is set to overtake the Pink Line to become Delhi Metro's longest corridor. With the recent approval by the Union Cabinet of a new 9.9km stretch from Ramakrishna Ashram Marg to Indraprastha, the corridor's total length will increase to 76.6km.At present, the Pink Line (Majlis Park-Shiv Vihar) is the longest corridor of the Delhi Metro network, spanning 59.2km. Once its Phase IV extension, from Majlis Park to Maujpur, becomes operational in the coming months, the Pink Line's length will rise to nearly 72km. Notwithstanding this expansion, the Magenta Line, with 56 stations, will emerge as the longest line.

"The Ramakrishna Ashram Marg-Indraprastha corridor is completely underground with nine stations.

This corridor of Phase VA extends the already operational (Krishna Park Extension to Botanical Garden of 39.2km) and under-construction (Krishna Park Extension to RK Ashram of 27.4km) sections of the Magenta Line further up to Indraprastha, thereby providing Metro connectivity to the Central Vista area," said a Delhi Metro Rail Corporation (DMRC) official.

The nine stations on the extension are RK Ashram Marg, Shivaji Stadium, Central Secretariat, Kartavya Bhawan, India Gate, War Memorial-High Court, Baroda House, Bharat Mandapam and Indraprastha.

This section provides more interchanges with other Metro lines: Yellow/Violet Line (Central Secretariat), Blue Line (Indraprastha) and Airport Line (Shivaji Stadium). It also provides connectivity to prominent areas like Yuge Yugeen Bharat Museum, Supreme Court, Patiala House Court and National Green Tribunal, among others."A dedicated subway is also proposed between Rajiv Chowk and Shivaji Stadium Metro stations to facilitate direct passenger interchange from the Airport Line to Rajiv Chowk (Connaught Place) on the Blue Line.

This extension will further help in decongesting Rajiv Chowk Metro station," said the official.At 20, the Yellow Line (from Samaypur Badli to Millennium City Centre, Gurgaon) currently has the highest number of underground stations. After completion of Phase VA, the Magenta Line will have the most underground stations — 31.As part of DMRC's Phase IV expansion, six new corridors with a total length of 112.4km and 94 new stations were planned.

Of these, the Majlis Park-Maujpur Metro corridor, the RK Ashram Marg-Janakpuri West corridor and the Aerocity–Tughlakabad corridor (new Golden Line) are slated to open to the public this year.Three additional corridors — Inderlok to Indraprastha (extension of Green Line), Rithala-Narela-Kundli (extension of Red Line) and Saket G Block-Lajpat Nagar corridor (extension of Golden Line) — were approved.Apart from RK Ashram Marg to Indraprastha, two other corridors recently got the nod as part of the VA expansion — Tughlaqabad to Kalindi Kunj and Aerocity to Terminal 1.