Rs15K cr projects in North-East, new policy for state highways development: Nitin Gadkari

Nitin Gadkari said the central government will encourage the local contractors in the region to take up civil works for road projects.

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Road minister Nitin Gadkari with Union Minister of State for Home Affairs Kiren Rijiju at the inauguration of Shillong bypass project in Ri Bhoi on Friday.(Source: PTI)

In a bid to boost road connectivity in the North-east, Union minister for road, transport and highways Nitin Gadkari on Friday said road development projects worth Rs 15,000 crore would be awarded across states in the current financial year.

Gadkari said, “A total of Rs 15,000 crore of roads projects will be awarded by the end of this year. Of this, Rs 6,000 crore of roads projects would be developed in Arunachal Pradesh and Rs 2,000 crore worth of projects each in Meghalaya and Nagaland. The remaining projects would be spread across other states.”

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Gadkari, who is on a four-day tour of the north-eastern states till May 2, said that the government has also decided to fund construction of state highways in the North-east to accelerate development of road infrastructure. “We have designed a new policy for developing roads projects in the North-east. If the state government takes care of land acquisition and environment and forest clearances, the central government will build state highways at its own cost”, said Gadkari. The Central government will continue to bear the land cost for national highway development.

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Further, to encourage participation of local contractors in road infrastructure projects, the government has decided to advance 20 per cent of project cost as machinery and mobilisation expense. “The cost of road construction in the North-east is four times that in other parts of the country. Most projects are being developed by contractors who do not belong to these states. To ensure local participation, we have decided to identify small projects of up to Rs 50 crore and we will pay in advance 20 per cent of the cost so that local youth can become involved in developmental works”, Gadkari said.

Union Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari

The minister was here to dedicate the 48.76 km Shillong Bypass connecting Umiam in Ri-Bhoi district and Mawryngkneng in East Khasi Hills District and the four-lane Jorabat-Barapani highway to the nation.

The Bypass was developed to decongest Shillong from trucks and heavy vehicles coming from or moving towards North-eastern part of Assam and other states like Mizoram and Tripura. The project developed at an estimated cost of Rs 226 crore was completed in record time — two years after work began in February 2011.

The National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) is also in the process of completing four-laning of Jorabat-Barapani highway to improve road connectivity between Guwahati and Shillong. The project length is 61.80 km which includes the Umsning Bypass (5.82 km). The work has been substantially completed except in the Umsning Bypass stretch where pre-construction activities such as survey and site layout work is in progress. Post the development of the road, travel time to Barapani from Guwahati has reduced significantly to one and a half hours as compared to the earlier duration of three hours.