Govt to award Rs 70,000 cr road contracts in FY12

Contracts for building 11,050 kms of roads will be awarded in the current fiscal year involving an estimated investment of Rs 70,000 crore, as per the target set by the Ministry of Road, Transport and Highways.

The ambitious road building plans were reviewed by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh today with Road Transport Minister CP Joshi and senior officials of the ministry and the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI).

Of the total work proposed to be awarded this fiscal, 7,300 km would be under the National Highways Development Project (NHDP), an increase of 44% over 5,095 km in 2010-11. Under this component, investment is earmarked at Rs 57,000 crore.

As part of a development strategy, the government wants to complete 1,759 km of roads in the Left Wing Extremism (LWE) affected areas this year involving an outlay of Rs 3,000 crore.

The road ministry plans to award 1,991 km road projects too under the Special Accelerated Road Development Programme in North-East where Rs 10,000 crore investment could be made.

India has 70,934 km national highways network. Work is in progress on 10,142 km as of March end, an official said after the review meeting.

The road ministry highlighted the problems for the speedy implementation of the road projects. It wanted expeditious approval from the Planning Commission for upgradation of 10,000 km of state roads to new national highways already cleared by a Group of Ministers.

Over and above this, 10,000 km roads also need to be upgraded to the national highways.

The ministry intends to make 12,000 km of stretches of national highways to be proper two-lane national highway standard.

"Additional allocation of funds are also required for maintenance and repair of national highways," a ministry official said, adding that the amount required is nothing less than Rs 1,000 crore.

Formulation of a road development plan for districts with large tribal population was also discussed.