US promises support, cooperation to India in road sector: Nitin Gadkari

Gadkari has asserted that inland waterways is also one of the important subjects in India

Union Road Transport and Highways Minister Nitin Gadkari on Tuesday said the US has extended its support and cooperation to India in road and transport sector.

"We have discussed road engineering, because for flyovers and concrete pyramids there are rules and regulations for the construction. They offered us that they will give us all technical cooperation for standardisation of our 'Indian core' for road construction, bridges and flyovers," Gadkari told ANI.

Gadkari, who is on a week-long visit to the US with an aim to attract Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) for the infrastructure sector, said the US is ready to share all kind of manuals and rules and regulations with India.

 

"The US National Highway Traffic Safety Authority is ready to cooperate with us. I feel it is a big task for the Indian Government, particularly for my department, that we can save the life of people, because this number is very big," he added.

Asserting that inland waterways is also one of the important subjects in India, the minister said the government has already passed a bill in Parliament.

Gadkari said the Government of India has within two years constructed 20 kms of road a day.

"We have already signed the road contact for more than 18,000 km. We have taken decision to convert our national highway from 96,000 km to 2 lakh km. Out of it, we have already cleared 55,000 as national highway," he added.

In a bid to woo investors, Gadkari said there is a huge opportunity for them.

"We explained all type of plans in the road sector. We talked particularly about the Sagarmala project, where we are expecting 12 lakh crores of investment," he added.

He said the government is very soon going to implement the Sagarmala project.

"In Indian scenario, our logistic cost is 18% and that is one of the obstacles for our exports. In China, it is 8%, and in European countries it is 8-12%. So, by creating this coastal transport and transport inland waterways, we can reduce the cost up to 12%. Only then it will be possible for us to fulfil 'Make in India'," he added.