Union Road Transport and Highways Minister Nitin Gadkari on Tuesday inaugurated and laid the foundation stone of 15 National Highway and ropeway projects worth Rs 4,000 crore in Hamirpur. Union Minister Anurag Thakur and Himachal Pradesh Public Works Minister Vikramaditya Singh were also present during the event held at the police line complex here. BJP's national president JP Nadda joined the programme virtually. Gadkari announced an additional Rs 150 crore for roads and bridges in Himachal Pradesh on the demand of Vikramaditya Singh and asked the state government to send a proposal to the Centre in this regard. Addressing a gathering, Gadkari said that the BJP and development are two faces of the same coin and by 2024, works worth Rs one lakh crore will be completed in the state. The progress would continue under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, he added. He asked people to join hands with PM Modi to carry out the development works and to make India a third-world
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Union minister Nitin Gadkari sent legal notices to Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge and general secretary Jairam Ramesh on Friday for allegedly sharing misleading and defamatory news contents about him on X. Gadkari's lawyer, Balendu Shekhar, said his client was shocked to know about, hear and see the contents and posts from the official handle of the Congress on the microblogging platform. Kharge and Ramesh deliberately posted a 19-second video clip of Gadkari's interview given to "The Lallantop" web portal, concealing the contextual intent and meaning of his words, the lawyer said. The notice said a sinister act has been committed with the sole intent and ulterior motive to fan and create confusion, sensation and disrepute to Gadkari in the eyes of public. It said it was also a futile endeavour to create rifts in the solidarity of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), which is poised to win the trust of people in the upcoming general election under the leadership of Prime Ministe
The Ministry of Road Transport and Highways (MoRTH) has approved an allocation of Rs 6,728.33 crore for constructing eight stretches on NH-913 (Frontier Highway) in Arunachal Pradesh as Intermediate Lane Road, spanning 305.50 km on Engineering Procurement Construction (EPC) mode, an official statement said on Thursday. Union Road Transport and Highways Minister Nitin Gadkari in a post on X said the development aims to enhance connectivity to border areas, fostering socio-economic progress. The Frontier Highway construction is expected to curb migration, encourage reverse habitation towards Arunachal Pradesh's border regions, Gadkari added. Furthermore, he said these frontier highway stretches will establish crucial road infrastructure, linking significant river basins, facilitating the development of numerous hydropower projects in the state. According to Gadkari, this predominantly greenfield road will connect sparsely populated Upper Arunachal areas, which are ideal for tourism,
According to the CMO, the Chief Minister said that under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Devbhoomi Uttarakhand is setting new dimensions in the field of road connectivity
The government will soon come out with a tender for introducing GPS-based highway toll collection system on national highways, Union minister Nitin Gadkari said on Wednesday. Gadkari said the pilot projects of GPS-based toll systems of the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways (MoRTH) have been successful and the government will soon come out with a tender for implementing the new toll collection system. "Pilot projects of GPS-based toll systems on national highways to replace toll plazas in the country have been successful... We will soon come out with a tender for introducing GPS-based toll collection systems on national highways," he said at an event here. The move is aimed at reducing traffic congestion and charging motorists for the exact distance travelled on the highways. The road transport and highways ministry has conducted two pilot projects of automatic number plate recognition systems (automatic number plate reader cameras) to enable automated toll collection without
Union Road Transport and Highways Minister Nitin Gadkari inaugurated and laid the foundation stones for 28 national highway (NH) projects worth Rs 6,600 crore in Odisha. Though his visit to Odisha was cancelled at the last minute, Gadkari launched these projects virtually. Among the inaugurated projects were a 79km four-lane road between Baharagora and Singhara on NH-49, valued at Rs 1,203 crore, and a 78km six-lane road from Chandikhol to Bhadrak on NH-16, costing Rs 2,035 crore. Additionally, the minister laid the foundation stones for 26 other road infrastructure projects in the state. During the event, Gadkari highlighted the significant progress in national highway development in Odisha since 2014. The total length of national highways in the state has increased from 4,639 km to 5,753 km during this period. The ministry has allocated nearly Rs 1.50 lakh-crore for highway development in Odisha, he added. From 2014 to 2024, around 4,250 km of roads were constructed in Odisha, w
The road ministry has included the provision of "deemed approval" in the revised document for request for proposal, for timely approval of reports submitted by Detailed Project Report (DPR) consultants. The Ministry of Road Transport and Highways (MoRTH) in a circular said timely approval of various reports submitted by consultants is considered a critical requirement for the preparation of timely DPRs. "Keeping that in view, provision of deemed approval has been included in the footnote below enclosure-III schedule for approval of reports," the circular added. The circular said approval or comments shall be communicated by the client to the consultant within the time period. "If no approval/comments are furnished within the time period by the client, it will be considered as deemed approval," it said. The circular said the deemed approval for submissions, the consultant will remain responsible for correctness of the submission. The ministry further said the officer(s) concerned
Five infrastructure projects of roads and railways have been recommended for approval under the PM GatiShakti initiative, the commerce and industry ministry said on Friday. These projects were assessed in the 65th Network Planning Group (NPG) meeting. "The NPG examined the projects from the perspective of integrated planning based on the PM GatiShakti principles. The project details were examined based on the planning/mapping on PM GatiShakti National Master Plan (NMP)," it said. The projects which are evaluated include highway projects in Goa, Meghalaya and Assam; construction of rail-over-rail bulb line in Bihar; and urban metro transit projects in Bengaluru and Delhi/NCR. The inter-ministerial NPG meets every fortnight and appraises infra projects to ensure multi-modality, synchronisation of efforts and comprehensive development in and around the project location. The initiative was launched to develop an integrated infrastructure to reduce logistics costs. All logistics and ..
Union Road Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari on Thursday said the Chennai-Bengaluru greenfield expressway was likely to be completed by December this year. Responding to supplementaries in the Lok Sabha, Gadkari urged the governments of Tamil Nadu and Kerala to help the National Highway Authority of India in making available construction material such as aggregates and fly ash for the projects in the respective states. "I am giving confidence to the House ... that we are trying our level best to complete the highway before December. The distance between Chennai and Bengaluru can be covered within two hours," the minister said. Gadkari said he had also spoken to Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M K Stalin and conveyed to him the problems faced by the NHAI in the construction of highways in the state. "I do not want to politicise the issue. But without getting aggregate, without getting all the things that we need for the road construction, how is it possible for us to complete the road," ..
The Union Minister of Road Transport & Highways has approved the construction of the Frontier Highway in three sections spanning a total of 202.14 km
Union Minister Nitin Gadkari on Sunday inaugurated three road overbridges in Lakhimpur Kheri through video-conferencing and said this will ease traffic congestion and add to the convenience of people. These overbridges have been built at Chhouch crossing, LRP crossing and Rajapur crossing on the Pilibhit-Basti national highway at a cost of Rs 297 crore. Virtually addressing a programme held at the LRP crossing, Gadkari lauded Union MoS Home Ajay Kumar Mishra. "The three road overbridges (ROBs) came into existence on the initiatives of Union MoS Home Ajay Kumar Mishra, who strived to push up these projects," he said. Gadkari highlighted that the three overbridges were completed in January 2024 two months before the stipulated time of March 2024. Speaking on the occasion, Mishra thanked Gadkari for acceding to his request for the overbridges and putting them into a reality in a record time. Mishra said that soon three more overbridges -- one on the Ghaghra river, other on the Shard
The arterial Jammu-Srinagar national highway remained closed for the second day on Friday due to landslip at various places, officials said. Authorities were trying to clear the landslip debris and restore the traffic on the road connecting Kashmir to rest of the country. More than 400 vehicles are stranded at various places along the highway, the officials said. The 270-km road was closed for traffic on Thursday following landslip at several places, including Sherbibi, Magerkote, Mehad Cafeteria and Dalwas, along the highway, the officials said.
Last year in December, Prime Minister Narendra Modi promised to make India the third-largest economy in the world in his third consecutive term
India's specially-abled population can actively contribute USD 1 trillion to the country's economy by 2047, according to a prominent Indian-American leader in the sector. Pranav Desai, the founder of the Voice of Specially Abled People, recently travelled to India and met top leaders of the ruling BJP in New Delhi including Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and BJP president J P Nadda; the Gujarat Chief minister in Ahmedabad to present his vision document for the cause. He also travelled to Goa for a volunteer meeting. In an interview with PTI, Desai said that with proper strategy, policy and action, India's specially-abled population can actively contribute to the nation's economic growth, ultimately achieving a USD 1 trillion contribution to the disability sector by 2047 in Viksit Bharat. India can be a leader in this sector. My proposal was well received in New Delhi, Desai said, referring to his conversations with the top leadership in India. Desai said in his meeting with ..
Union minister Nitin Gadkari on Sunday said those coal mines in Maharashtra's Vidarbha region and WCL areas which are economically not viable, produce low-quality coal, and where mining is almost stopped can be used for coal gasification projects. He was addressing a session on 'coal gasification' at the Advantage Vidarbha event in Nagpur city which was attended by coal secretary Amritlal Meena, Niti Aayog member VK Saraswat and Coal India Limited (CIL) chairman PM Prasad among others. During his speech, the Minister for Road Transport and Highways asked the CIL and the Coal Ministry whether "coal mines which are economically not viable and those with low-quality coal and where mining is almost stopped in Vidarbha and Western Coal Fields (WCL) areas" could be used for coal gasification projects. He also pitched for the use of non-viable coal blocks and low-quality ones under WCL areas for coal gasification. The Union minister backed public-private partnerships in coal gasification
The highways ministry will shift to quality-cum-cost based system for the selection of bids for various road construction-related projects in place of the age-old least-cost selection process, Union Minister Nitin Gadkari said. The move is aimed at improving the quality of various infrastructure-related works in the country, the minister said at an event organised by the International Road Federation (IRF). Gadkari further said road engineering solutions must be taken care of while preparing Detailed Project Reports (DPR). "The road ministry will soon be adopting a qualitative tendering process instead of the least cost bidding process to bring in quality and road safety in various projects. "Qualitative tendering will help incorporate road safety features in designs keeping in mind the behaviour of the road users," the Road Transport and Highways minister said. Gadkari said bad road engineering is the biggest culprit for increasing road accidents in the country. Elaborating furt
Prime Minister Narendra Modi will inaugurate and lay the foundation stones of several development projects in Maharashtra's Solapur on Friday, according to an official release. At a public programme scheduled to be held around 10.45 am in the southern Maharashtra city, he will lay the foundation stones of eight AMRUT (Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation) projects in the state worth around Rs 2,000 crore, it said. He will also dedicate more than 90,000 houses built under the Pradhan Mantri Awas Yojana (Urban). Further, the PM will dedicate 15,000 houses of the Raynagar Housing Society in Solapur whose beneficiaries include thousands of "handloom workers, vendors, powerloom workers, rag pickers, Bidi workers and drivers", it said. Modi will also kickstart the distribution of the first and second instalments to 10,000 beneficiaries of PM-SVANIDHI in Maharashtra during the programme, it added.
The government may look for providing incentives or supporting initiatives to retrofit old vehicles into electric vehicles instead of scrapping them, a report said on Thursday. According to the joint report by management consultancy firm Primus Partners and ETB (European Business and Technology Centre), transitioning the internal combustion engine-powered vehicles to electric vehicles through retrofitting presents a spectrum of challenges. However, with a coordinated approach involving government initiatives, industry collaboration, and public engagement, these challenges can be effectively addressed and overcome, it said. India's Vehicle Scrappage Policy is aimed at phasing out old and unfit vehicles and replacing them with newer and more environment-friendly ones. This policy is governed by various factors including the fitness and emission levels of vehicles rather than solely their age. Commercial vehicles over 15 years and passenger vehicles over 20 years of age are subject t
Sharp Sight Eye Hospital's new facility is spread across 45,000 square feet hospital and can serve over 1000 patients daily in its Outpatient Department (OPD)