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Nitin Gadkari promises to complete highways ahead of schedule

I do not have a problem with raising funds, but the main problem is the slow movement of files and approval process: Gadkari

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Road Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari
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Road Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari has advanced the deadline of 314 big-ticket national highway projects to December 2018 from the earlier target of mid-2019, when the next general elections are scheduled to be held.

It’s an ambitious goal but one that Gadkari is determined to meet with no excuses being brooked, top officials told DNA. The minister, they added, had directed all implementing agencies such as the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) and the National Highways Development Authority (NHDP) to sort out issues associated with every highway so that there are no delays.

A senior official from the ministry of road, transport and highways explained that highway projects often get delayed because of a variety of factors. These could include land acquisition issues, legal tangles, problems at the concessionaire’s end, delay on the part of the officials in submitting design drawings, slow disbursement of money, environmental clearances and removal of encroachments.

“However, the minister has given directives to all implementing agencies to sort out issues, irrespective of their nature, so that the December 2018 deadline is met and said that no excuse will be accepted,” the official added. A list of 202 such projects accessed by DNA includes important port connectivity projects like Gujarat-Maharashtra border to Surat-Hazira port and expressway projects such as Ennore expressway projects in Chennai.

Then there are road projects to decongest cities, including the eastern peripheral expressway project to decongest Delhi and strategically important highway projects in the north-east such as Assam-West Bengal border. Also in the list is the Rs12,000 crore Chardham highway project in Uttarakhand, which will improve connectivity between the pilgrimage centres of Kedarnath, Badrinath, Gangotri and Yamunotri.

In a recent workshop on passenger mobility and transportation organised by government think tank Niti Aayog, Gadkari had asked vice-chairman Arvind Panagariya to come up with a solution to stop red-tape and speed up the approval process so that highway projects do not get stuck.

“I do not have a problem with raising funds, but the main problem is the slow movement of files and approval process. I request you to come up with a solution for this,” he had said.

Gadkari has also said the target of constructing highways would reach 30 km per day by March this year. As of now, it stands at 18.23 km per day compared to an average of 16.6 km per day in 2015-16. After assuming power, Gadkari had set the goal at 41 km per day. A total of 6,604 km (of the set target of 15,000 km) of national highways had been constructed till February 2017.

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