Centre paves way for expressway projects

Plans 1,000-km of expressways at Rs 16,680 cr under special highways development initiative

The government is planning a separate mechanism for expressways to expedite work. A report on this will be submitted by a committee comprising Deepak Dasgupta, former chairman of the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) and R C Sinha, former IAS officer. The duo was also asked by the highways ministry to draw up a plan to revamp NHAI.

“The idea is to expedite work on different expressways. The government is focused on improving connectivity across the country,” said an official in the highways ministry.

The government plans to build 1,000 km of expressways at an estimated cost of Rs 16,680 crore under the National Highways Development Programme Phase VI. The Centre is planning to start work on eight world-class express highways. “These express highways will match the quality of those in advanced nations. Once completed, they will result in huge saving in fuel costs,” the official said.

The government has awarded contracts for the 135 km Eastern Peripheral Expressway around the National Capital Region to be developed in six phases connecting Kundli and Palwal in Haryana. The foundation stone for the Delhi-Meerut Expressway is likely to be laid on December 31 by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

The main criterion for selection of expressway corridors is traffic volume and Vadodara-Mumbai (400 km) will be considered for a feasibility study.

The remaining 600 km will be chosen on the basis of traffic volume.

The corridors approved for development are Delhi-Chandigarh (250 km), Bengaluru-Chennai (262 km), Delhi-Jaipur (273 km), Delhi-Meerut (54 km), Kolkata-Dhanbad (277 km), Delhi-Agra (200 km), Vadodara-Mumbai (400 km) and the Eastern Peripheral Expressway.

Most of these will be concrete expressways. An express highway is a controlled-access highway, mostly six-lane or above, where entrance and exit are controlled by the use of slip roads.

The ministry has also received proposals from state governments for expressways like Nagpur-Mumbai, Jaipur-Ajmer-Ahmedabad, Pune-Hyderabad, Hyderabad-Bengaluru, Amravati-Hyderabad, Delhi-Amritsar and Jammu-Katra.

The official said the Centre was examining the option of expressways in partnership with state governments. State governments could contribute land or be part of joint ventures for the proposed expressways.