After a lull, the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) is in the process of awarding 100 projects in the fourth quarter of this financial year. The projects are in various phases of award and will be given out before March.
“Around 14,000 km of road projects, worth around Rs 1 lakh crore, are in various stages of award process and will be awarded in the last quarter of this financial year. This will help us clear a lot of backlog,” said a senior NHAI official, who did not want to be identified.
Award of road projects had been dismal under former minister T R Baalu, which prompted the government to bring in Kamal Nath at the helm. After joining, Nath set a target to build roads at 20 km a day, increasing it from the earlier pace of around 3 km a day. He also came up with work plans for two financial years, setting a target of awarding over 200 projects with a value of over Rs 2 lakh crore in the two financial years ending March 2011.
In contrast, NHAI has been able to award only 65 projects till now. According to a recent report by the ministry of statistics and programme implementation, NHAI widened or upgraded only 859.93 km of roads, against a target of 1,168.97 km. The progress was 33 per cent lower than 1,283 km achieved during the corresponding period last year.
A review in August by the Planning Commission also presented bleak picture of infrastructure ministries. The road transport and highways ministry has been given a target to spend Rs 35,680 crore in 2010-11 to construct 2,500 km of highways. Overall, the infrastructure ministries could spend only 61.27 per cent of the total allocation of Rs 29,934.67 crore in the first quarter.
Various reasons like absence of a permanent chairman and allegations of bungling in the award of road projects, leading to raids by the Central Bureau of Investigation, have been given for the performance.
The highways authority, which was awarding projects at a rate of around 12 projects every month, did not award any projects after the CBI raids on May 26.