Govt approves Rs 17,000-crore highways projects for 9 states
New Delhi: To fast track building of highways, the government on Friday cleared projects worth about Rs 17,000 crore to be awarded before March.
As many as 18 projects for building about 1,000 kms of highways, including nine on the recently approved hybrid annuity mode, were approved in a meeting today, chaired by Road Transport and Highways Secretary Sanjay Mitra.
“Eighteen projects were approved in Expenditure Finance Committee/Standing Finance Committee meeting today. These projects for Rajasthan, Gujarat, Maharashtra, Kerala, Odisha, Uttar Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Chhattishgarh and Punjab entail an investment of about Rs 17,000 crore,” Mitra said.
These projects under National Highways Development Project (NHDP) and other schemes will be bid out by March, he added.
The projects under EPC (engineering, procurement and construction) mode include Rs 1,249 crore Bar-Bilara-Jodhpur stretch on NH 112 in Rajasthan, Rs 1,453 crore Mukkola Junction-Kerala stretch in Kerala, Rs 426 crore Kamrej-Chaltan stretch on NH 8 in Gujarat and Rs 813 crore Aligarh-Muradabad stretch in Uttar Pradesh.
The other projects on EPC mode are Rs 1,070 crore end of Jalandhar bypass-Hoshiarpur-Punjab/Himachal Pradesh border in Punjab and Rs 995 crore Karnataka/AP border to Gooty section on NH 67 in Andhra Pradesh besides Rs 1,102 and Rs 491 crore projects in Maharashtra and Chhattisgarh, respectively.
The only BOT (build, operate, toll) project pertains to Rs 1,280 crore Dhule to Aurangabad section of NH 211 in Maharashtra, he said.
The remaining projects approved today are under the recently approved hybrid annuity mode in which the government will provide 40 per cent of the grants-in-aid.
The Cabinet had last month approved hybrid annuity model for building roads to fast-track highway projects, revive the Public-Private-Partnership (PPP) mode and attract more investments in the sector.
Under this model, the government provides 40 percent of the project cost to the developer while remaining 60 percent investment has to be made by the developer.
Road Transport and Highways Minister Nitin Gadkari had recently said, “No one (private players) was ready to participate in the PPP-based projects as they had lost faith (in the previous government).
“However, to encourage private participation, we have also introduced a hybrid model, where we will share the risk with them.” The Secretary said that majority of land acquisition has been done for the projects and work will begin next week.
He added that most of the projects pertain to widening of roads that include four and six-laning of National Highways.
The projects under hybrid annuity mode include Rs 549 and Rs 633 crore ring roads/ bypasses for Nagpur city, Rs 829 crore Taleja to Mahuva section, Rs 764 crore Mahuva to Kagavadar section, Rs 719 crore Kagavadar to Una section and Rs 758 crore Una to Kodinar section in Gujarat.
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Source:zeenews
