After eight years of battling through the mountains, harsh winter weather and a simmering Islamic insurgency, India has defied continuing violence in Kashmir to open the first train service in the region.

Manmohan Singh, the Indian Prime Minister, paid a fleeting visit to Srinagar, the summer capital of Indian-controlled Kashmir, on Saturday to flag off the first train to travel along the new 73-mile railway line, which has been under discussion for more than a century.

Only 41 miles of the new line are complete — connecting the towns of Baramulla in the north and Qazigund in the south — but it will be linked eventually to the rest of India's railway network.

Indian officials say that the £277 million project is a feat of railway engineering second only to China's railway to Lhasa, the Tibetan capital, completed in 2006. Thousands of engineers worked on the project, which began in 2000, braving the constant threat of attack by militants as well as appalling conditions during Kashmir's long, harsh winters. An Indian engineer and his brother were killed by suspected militants in 2004 and a policeman was killed in 2007 in another attack on a group of engineers. The opening ceremony came a day after police shot and killed two Muslims during demonstrations against the Prime Minister's visit. Shops, schools and offices were all closed after separatist leaders and trade unions called a two-day strike to protest against Mr Singh's presence.

Thousands of soldiers, police and paramilitaries patrolled Srinagar for the ceremony, which was also attended by Sonia Gandhi, the Italian-born head of the ruling Congress Party. The idea of a railway to Kashmir was first proposed in 1898 by Pratap Singh, the Maharajah of Jammu and Kashmir, whose nephew's indecision over whether to join India or Pakistan at Partition led to the continuing dispute over the region.

The British also considered building a railway between Srinagar and Rawalpindi, in present-day Pakistan, in the early 20th century but shelved the plans because of political and logistical difficulties. Indira Gandhi, the Indian Prime Minister who was later assassinated, began construction finally of a 34-mile railway from the city of Jammu to Udhampur in 1983, but that was not completed until 2005.

For now, Kashmir's new line will have nine stations and two trains pulling air-conditioned carriages with large windows through which to view the mountain scenery. Those living in remote areas along the route will be the main beneficiaries; the train will take only 45 minutes to travel from Qazigund to Srinagar, compared with three hours by bus.

The Government hopes that the service will provide an economic boost to a Muslim-majority region where poverty and poor public services have fuelled a violent uprising against Indian rule since 1989. Officials said the new Kashmir trains would be guarded against attacks by a new railway police force.

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