Bharatmala collaterals

The large roads programme comes embedded with a clutch of associated issues

On October 24, 2017, the nation was presented with a “historic road building programme” called Bharatmala.

It envisages 83,677 km of construction of new roads over the next five years at an investment of Rs 6.90 lakh crore. The plan encompasses connecting economically important nodes, feeder routes, border roads, coastal roads, port connectivity and greenfield expressways. It is heartening to see Indian public systems morph from a project to a programmatic approach. Clearly, the immediate beneficiaries are going to be the road construction companies and construction equipment manufacturers. The stock markets have already given a thumbs-up to these companies. (see box)

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