Over 44% national highway projects are delayed: Nitin Gadkari in Parliament

“From amongst 952 projects, including National Highways (NHs) projects, costing more than Rs.150 crore which were under construction in March 2024, 419 projects spilled beyond their original completion schedule, missing one or the other of the various stages of project completion up to March 2024 and excluding projects under consideration for termination / foreclosure,” said Gadkari while responding to the questions asked by Trinamool congress Rajya Sabha MP Mohammed Nadimul Haque.

He further said that the primary reasons for delay in NH projects are bottlenecks relating to land acquisition, delay in getting statutory clearances, encroachment removal, law & order, poor performance of Contractor and Force Majeure events like Covid-19 pandemic, heavy rainfall, floods, cyclone, landslides etc.

“The Ministry of Road Transport & Highways has taken steps to streamline land acquisition, environmental clearance, and utility shifting. The Government is also leveraging the mechanism of review at various levels for resolution of bottlenecks / hindrances in ongoing projects, in active collaboration with State Governments and other stakeholders,” said the Minister.

The data shows that out of 32 states and union territories, the maximum number of 59 projects (over 58%) have been delayed in Maharashtra. Apart from this 23 of 29 projects in Manipur have been delayed.

Similarly, 22 of 31 projects in Gujarat, 22 of 78 projects in Uttar Pradesh, 22 of 48 projects in Karnataka, 19 of 75 projects in Andhra Pradesh, 19 of 44 projects in Bihar, 18 of 40 projects in Tamil Nadu, 17 of 38 projects in Jammu & Kashmir and 16 projects in Uttarakhand & Odisha each have been delayed.

A total of three of five projects in National Capital also have been delayed. Similarly, a total of 9 projects in Assam, 12 projects in Chhattisgarh, 9 projects in Haryana, six projects in Himachal Pradesh, 8 projects in Jharkhand, 4 projects in Kerala, 8 projects in Madhya Pradesh and six projects in Punjab are delayed.

While Gadkari did not provide information on if delay has resulted in increase in the project cost, he said that Cost overrun is not incurred in all delayed projects.

“If delay is not attributable to the Contractor, price escalation as per defined formula is paid as per contract conditions, which may or may not result in additional cost, depending upon final value of price escalation determined on actual completion and final settlement of bills after expiry of the project contract/concession period. If delay is attributable to the Contractor, damages are imposed and there is no additional cost due to delay,” said Nitin Gadkari.