UP acquires 95% of land for 595-km Ganga Expressway mega project

The mega project is estimated to be commissioned in November 2025

At a time when hordes of infrastructure projects in the country are stuck and in danger of being shut down owing to land acquisition delays, the Uttar Pradesh government has already acquired almost 95 percent of the land required for the mega 595-km Ganga Expressway project. In addition, 77 percent of the clearing and grubbing of the land has already been achieved, said the state's industrial development minister, Nand Gopal Gupta Nandi.

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“We have received the environment and forest clearances for the project, while more than 52 percent of the shifting of utilities has been done. We have also appointed independent engineers for all the four groups of the expressway,” Nandi said.

The state nodal agency, UP Expressway Industrial Development Authority (UPEIDA) has so far acquired more than 7,000 hectares of the estimated 7,456 hectares required for the Meerut-Prayagraj Ganga Expressway, which will cost over Rs 36,200 crore. In December 2021, Prime Minister Narendra Modi laid the foundation of the Ganga Expressway in Shahjahanpur district.

The access-controlled six-lane (expandable to eight lanes) greenfield Ganga Expressway project has been divided into four groups with three packages each, thus a total of 12 packages for ensuring speedier completion of the civil works.

The expressway is being built under the Design Bid Finance Operate and Transfer (DBFOT) template of a public-private partnership (PPP) mode. The concessionaries Adani Enterprises and IRB Infra are respectively developing nine and three packages each of the flagship project.

The expressway, touted as India’s largest expressway project in its category, is aligned with the trillion-dollar target of the Yogi Adityanath government in Uttar Pradesh.

While the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is aiming to become a trillion-dollar economy by 2027, the expressway project is estimated to be commissioned in the next 36 months or by November 2025.

The project will facilitate speedier passenger and cargo movements, and bolster industrial corridors, agricultural marketing value chains and tourism circuits. It will crisscross 12 UP districts viz. Meerut, Hapur, Bulandshahar, Amroha, Sambhal, Badaun, Shahjahanpur, Hardoi, Unnao, Rae Bareli, Pratapgarh and Prayagraj (Allahabad).

UP will have nine access-controlled expressways on the completion of the Ganga Expressway and 91-km Gorakhpur Link Expressway. The total length of the expressways in UP would then jump to 1,910 km.

With the nearly 1,225 km of currently operational seven expressways out of the total of 2,587 km of expressways in India, UP accounts for 47 percent of the country’s composite length of expressways.

Some of the functional UP expressways include Yamuna Expressway, Agra-Lucknow Expressway, Purvanchal Expressway, and Bundelkhand Expressway.

According to Nandi, the expressways cover the length and breadth of the state thereby catalysing the industrial and economic spectrum, boosting agriculture and micro, small and medium enterprises (MSME) sectors, and bolstering jobs and self-employment opportunities.

Additionally, an airstrip will be developed on Ganga Expressway for the emergency landing and takeoff of the Indian Air Force (IAF) aircraft. The Agra-Lucknow and Purvanchal expressways also offer such facilities, putting UP in a league of its own offering operational readiness during possible combat situations.