Road Transport and Highways Minister Kamal Nath is a man in a hurry. Soon after he took over in June last year, he announced ambitious plans to build 20 km of road a day.
But by his own recent admission, he has been able to achieve 13 km a day – far short of the target, though much more than the 2 km a day achieved during the first five years of the United Progressive Alliance.
Nath was, however, quick to say that come June, the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) would be able to achieve the 20 km target.
The minister has many admirers but there are several who do not share his enthusiasm. To achieve the target, the minister has asked NHAI to prepare an annual work plan and award projects on that basis. NHAI has prepared two work plans for the first two years, under which it plans to award 11,928 km of projects till June this year and 11,721 km in the next financial year.
Even though the NHAI has already awarded 44 road projects totalling around 6,000 km, officials say they do not foresee the same kind of response for a major chunk of road projects to be awarded in the next financial year.
“In the second work plan, 8,959 km out of 11,721 km are two-lane highways that are not financially viable. These are unlikely to attract bids under the public-private partnership plan. This might delay all the progress we have achieved till now,” said an NHAI official, who did not want to be identified.
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The earlier plan was to upgrade all national highways to four-lane. This was later revised to two-lane to make them financially viable. However, the toll rate on a two-lane road is 40 per cent lower than a four-lane one, still keeping them financially unviable.
To build 7,000 km of roads a year, there has to be work in progress on 18,000 km of highways.
Others say any target can be achieved in terms of awarding projects, but it’s a different story when it comes to actual work on the ground. “Neither 13 km a day has been achieved nor the 20 km a day target can be achieved in the near future,” said an industry source.
But many feel that would be too cynical a view as the minister’s enthusiasm has helped rev up the system at least. “Whether 20 km is achievable or not is not the question. Here is a minister who aims at taking the road projects from 2 km a day to 20 km and doing his bit to make that happen and that is evident. Even if he achieves 15 km, that will be an achievement,” says Parvez Umrigar, managing director, Gammon Infrastructure.
Nath’s achievements include convincing the prime minister to form a committee to look into all the issues slowing the highway project, an exercise that gave NHAI more autonomy.
“To our surprise, we have received around 88 applications for a single project. This shows the interest road projects are generating and the credit goes to the minister,” says an NHAI official.
Arvind Mahajan, Executive Director, KPMG, a consultancy firm, says the ambitious target has developed a sense of urgency amongst all stakeholders.