New Gitaldaha | |||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| General information | |||||
| Location | Cooch Behar,West Bengal India | ||||
| Coordinates | 26°02′07″N89°29′20″E / 26.03524°N 89.48884°E /26.03524; 89.48884 | ||||
| System | Indian Railways station | ||||
| Other information | |||||
| Status | Line out of service | ||||
| History | |||||
| Opened | 1900 | ||||
| Closed | 1955–1960? | ||||
| Previous names | Cooch Behar State Railway | ||||
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New Gitaldaha railway station is on the broad-gaugeAlipurduar–Bamanhat branch line.[1]
Gitaldaha was a railway station and is a defunct rail transit point on the India–Bangladesh border inCooch Behar district in the Indian state ofWest Bengal. The corresponding point on the Bangladesh side isMogalhat inLalmonirhat District.[2][3]

The area was agog with railway activity in the 19th–20th century. The Assam Behar State Railway linkedParbatipur toKatihar, with ametre-gauge line in 1889. In the early 1900s, theEastern Bengal Railway extended railways toLalmonirhat, Gitaldaha (viaMogalhat),Bamanhat,Golokganj and other places, thereby connecting Assam to Katihar, in Bihar, via North Bengal. In 1901Cooch Behar State Railway built thenarrow-gauge line from Gitaldaha toJayanti, near the Bhutan border. Shortly thereafter, the line was upgraded to meter gauge.[4][5]
The Lalmonirhat–Mogalhat–Gitaldaha route was functional when India and Pakistan agreed in 1955 for resumption of railway traffic between the two countries, and it included movement of cross traffic via Mogalhat through the Eastern Bengal Railway.[6] A portion of the bridge across the Dharla River at26°00′11″N89°28′10″E / 26.00304°N 89.46934°E /26.00304; 89.46934 was washed away by floods in 1988.[7][8]
Alipurduar-Bamanhat branch line | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Defunct Lalmonirhat–Geetaldaha line | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
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Prior to thepartition of India, the prestigiousAssam Mail used to travel fromSantahar toGuwahati.[9]
The conversion of the 72 km-longAlipurduar–Bamanhat branch line to5 ft 6 in (1,676 mm)broad gauge in 2007, and its subsequent recommissioning, had a station at New Gitaldaha.[10]
New Gitaldaha railway station servesGitaldaha and the surrounding areas.
The map alongside presents the position as it stands today (2020). The international border was not there when the railways were first laid in the area in the 19th-20th century. It came up in 1947. The map is 'interactive' (the larger version) - it means that all the places shown in the map are linked in the full screen map.