Panel to probe issue of Rs 57 cr annual cost on bitumen coat

Government has formed a committee to examine the issue of additional spray of bitumen while building roads over certain allegations that at least Rs 57 crore is wasted annually.
The committee would examine "whether applying tack coat over prime coat is fundamentally necessary or should the requirement of tack coat over the prime coat be dispensed with", as per the Road Transport and Highways Ministry.
The eight-member committee, headed by ADG-II, Highways will examine the issue in the wake of complaint by Prithvi Singh Kandhal -- Additional Director Emeritus, National Centre for Asphalt Technology, Auburn University, Alabama US. He wrote to Road Transport and Highways Minister Nitin Gadkari that India annually loses about Rs 57 crore on additional coating.

The letter said that such practice of additional coating was "criminal loss" and was not in practice in any advanced nation whether US, Australia, Europe or South Africa.
"I request you again to take immediate action to stop this unnecessary criminal loss of about Rs 57 crore every year in highway construction," Kandhal wrote to Gadkari seeking his intervention.
"This additional tack coat (additional spray of bitumen on stone after prime coat when a new road is constructed) is fundamentally unnecessary and is a sheer waste of public funds ...In India because bitumen is very expensive," he said.
According to experience in the US, additional bitumen spray combined with prime coat can result in excessive bitumen over the stone course, which has the potential of being rather harmful to the performance of the road pavement, the letter said.