Dhumal said the minister will not only solve problems of people relating to his ministry, but also receive representations regarding other departments and try to solve them as well. Each minister would sit at Dharamshala for a week. However, the entire government would be here during the winter sojourn. The entire Council of Ministers is presently in Dharamshala for the winter sojourn. While some ministers arrived on Wednesday, the remaining reached here today.

On his arrival, the CM said the government would continue with its thanksgiving rallies across the state. He said two more such rallies would be held at Palampur and Dharamshala.

Touching upon the issue of railway network in the state, Dhumal said he had written to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and requested him to extend the Bhanupalli-Bilaspur-Beri railway line to Mandi and connect it with the Pathankot-Jogindernagar railway line.

He said China had already connected Lhasa in Tibet with an all-weather railway line by making use of modern technology, whereas our country had only air services to carry supplies to forward posts, which, too, largely depended on weather.

He said the proposal was strategically very important and a debate at the national level had already started to explore the possibilities of constructing a railway line through Himachal. “I had also met Union Finance Minister P. Chidambaram and Railways Minister Laloo Prasad Yadav in this regard,” he said.

He added that he had met some private entrepreneurs who had offered to take up the job of constructing a railway line in the state if the Central government takes a policy decision in this regard. The railway network would not only help people, but also give a big boost to tourism and help exploit the state tourism potential, he said.

The Chief Minister said a Cabinet meeting would be held here tomorrow and cases of industrial houses would be cleared under the single-window system.