The Goods and Services Tax (GST), which subsumed all indirect taxes and was implemented from July one this year, is likely to raise the construction cost of East-West Metro being constructed by Kolkata Metro Rail Corporation (KMRC). KMRC Managing Director, Satish Kumar said “GST will definitely raise the construction cost. But the exact amount of the rise is yet to be ascertained.”

Briefing reporters in Kolkata on Saturday, he said that tunneling work under Brabourne Road in the city has been completed and work on the Esplanade station already started. There will be five levels at Esplanade station and function as a confluence of the three metro railways – the East-West Metro, North-South Metro and the Joka-BBD Bag Metro.

Work on the Mahakaran metro station will start soon, he said, adding that the first phase of the project from Salt Lake to Phool Bagan have been targetted to go operational from June 2018. Kumar said that entire stretch from Howrah Maidan to Salt Lake was expected to be operational from December 2020.

Efforts have been made to keep settlement of the soil within 30 mm which, according to him, would not do much damage to the buildings falling on the tunneled route.

Once the construction was complete, the operations of the East-West metro would be transferred to the North-South Metro authorities. Total cost of the 16.55-km project had been pegged at Rs 4874 crore so far, he added.