RoadMin may miss 9,000-km project award target in FY14

Delays in award is due to delay in land acquisition process

The Ministry of Road Transport and Highways may again fall short of achieving its target of awarding projects for constructing 9,000 km of highways this financial year.

It is likely to award over 5,000 km of highway projects by the end of the current financial year, a top official said.

"So far we have awarded about 1,300 km highway projects and we will be able to tender about 4,000 km more such projects through the EPC (engineering, procurement and construction) mode by the end of this fiscal," the ministry official told PTI.

"The delays in award is mainly due to delay in land acquisition process and if it is not 90% complete we will not go ahead with the award process, " he added.

The government has set a target of awarding 9,000 km highway projects in 2013-14. This goal was set by the then Road Minister C P Joshi in April 2013.

The delay in award of projects was mainly due to delayed land acquisition process.

"We had to acquire 90% of the land required for the project before awarding it," he said.

Some of the projects which will be awarded are spill over of the last fiscal's target.

The Road Ministry, which had set a target of awarding 8,800 km projects in 2012-13, was able to tender a little over 1,900 km.

"Some of the projects to be awarded are the ones which need to be converted from BOT (Build, Operate and Transfer) mode to EPC," he said adding that the length of these projects is about 900 km.

However, there are various other BOT projects which will be converted to EPC mode but the land acquisition process for those road projects is underway.

EPC model is the one where the project is funded by the government and the private firms design and build the road.