<P> The then Chief Minister of West Bengal , Dr. Bidhan Chandra Roy , first conceived the idea of building an Underground Railway for Kolkata in early 1950s . A survey was done by a team of French experts , but nothing concrete came of this . Efforts to solve the problem by augmenting the existing fleet of public transport vehicles hardly helped , since roads accounted for only 4.2 % of the surface area in Kolkata , compared with 25 % in Delhi and even 30 % in other cities . With the goal of finding alternative solutions to alleviate the suffering of commuters , the Metropolitan Transport Project ( Railways ) ( MTP ) was set up in 1969 . The MTP ( Rlys ) , with help of Soviet specialists ( Lenmetroproekt ) and East German engineers , prepared a master plan to provide five rapid - transit ( metro ) lines for the city of Kolkata , totalling a route length of 97.5 km in 1971 . However , only three were selected for construction . These were : </P>
<P> The then Chief Minister of West Bengal , Dr. Bidhan Chandra Roy , first conceived the idea of building an Underground Railway for Kolkata in early 1950s . A survey was done by a team of French experts , but nothing concrete came of this . Efforts to solve the problem by augmenting the existing fleet of public transport vehicles hardly helped , since roads accounted for only 4.2 % of the surface area in Kolkata , compared with 25 % in Delhi and even 30 % in other cities . With the goal of finding alternative solutions to alleviate the suffering of commuters , the Metropolitan Transport Project ( Railways ) ( MTP ) was set up in 1969 . The MTP ( Rlys ) , with help of Soviet specialists ( Lenmetroproekt ) and East German engineers , prepared a master plan to provide five rapid - transit ( metro ) lines for the city of Kolkata , totalling a route length of 97.5 km in 1971 . However , only three were selected for construction . These were : </P>
who took the initiative to plan the first underground railway in kolkata
who took the initiative to plan the first underground railway in kolkata
The MTP ( Rlys ) Soviet specialists ( Lenmetroproekt ) East German engineers
The MTP ( Rlys ) Soviet specialists ( Lenmetroproekt ) East German engineers