After failing to get bids for over half of its highway projects last year, the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) has decided to put up 19 highway projects worth Rs 23,805 crore for rebidding next month through a new short-listing process.
The company also needs to get its power plants going if it wants to reduce its debt burden.
The projects include six-laning of highway stretches in Rajasthan, Gujarat and Andhra Pradesh, four-laning of highway stretches in Gujarat, Maharashtra and Madhya Pradesh and two-laning with paved shoulders of stretches in Punjab and Rajasthan.
Raut was responding to a reporter's question about opposition parties' claim that Gadkari was targeted through the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG) report on alleged irregularities in the work done by the National Highway Authority of India (NHAI).
In what could be a shot in the arm for the National Highway Development Programme, the National Highway Authority of India is all set to receive a windfall of Rs 471 crore
According to a three-year-old article published in Lokmat, the bridge was in a terrible condition and the National Highways Authority who were aware of the condition did nothing to fix it.
An old bridge across Kali river in Uttara Kannada district collapsed in the small hours of Wednesday, resulting in heavy traffic along National Highway 66, connecting Goa to Karnataka.
'If our Budget allows, we may implement both measures -- making income up to Rs 10 lakh tax-free and introducing a 25 per cent slab for income between Rs 15 lakh and Rs 20 lakh.'
"Land acquisition is the biggest issue. Now contracts will be awarded if 80 per cent of the land is acquired and is in possession of National Highway Authority of India," minister for road transport and highways Kamal Nath said during the Question Hour in the Lok Sabha. On members' complaints regarding 'very high' toll rates in public-private partnership projects, the minister defended the existing rates and said reduced toll would mean less roads.
'If inner line permit was in place in Meghalaya, the details of the three people who allegedly murdered Raja would have been on record.'
The implementation of this toll collection system, which will eventually eradicate toll booths, necessitates the fitting of an on-board unit (OBU) in every vehicle that can track a vehicle's location in real time.
While presenting the Union Budget 2021-22 in Parliament, the finance minister said poll-bound West Bengal will see highway projects worth Rs 25,000 crore. She also announced that highway projects worth Rs 65,000 crore will be undertaken in Kerala. She also announced an Rs 18,000-crore scheme to augment public transport in urban areas.
This is the first time that highway projects awarded by the NHAI have failed to achieve financial closure.
According to senior officials of the National Highways Authority of India, this project is part of a larger 245-km highway development project connecting Hyderabad and Solapur.
Consumption of cement, steel, and bitumen is to get a boost of Rs 42,000 crore (Rs 420 billion), as the National Highways Authority of India has announced to award 7,994 km of highway projects in the current financial year.
Toll booths may be kept 50 km apart for seamless travel
The National Highways Authority of India and the road transport ministry together have constructed 1,314 km of highways in the current financial year till August 31.
The central government has finalised GPS-based toll collection to ensure seamless movement of vehicles across the country.
The Delhi-Gurgaon Road witnessed traffic snarls on Tuesday after the authorities closed one carriageway and created a diversion for construction on the Dwarka Expressway.
The National Highways Authority of India on Wednesday said it needs to borrow up to Rs 20,000 crore (Rs 200 billion) per year for the next 15 years to implement Rs 9 lakh crore (Rs 9 trillion) worth of road projects in the PPP mode till 2031-32.
Protesters in West Bengal's Murshidabad district set fire to police vehicles and hurled stones during a demonstration against the Waqf (Amendment) Act. The incident occurred on Tuesday afternoon in the Jangipur area, where a large crowd had gathered demanding the withdrawal of the legislation. Police responded with lathi charges and tear gas to control the situation. Several people were detained and police personnel were injured in the stone-pelting. The West Bengal Police has said the situation is under control and strict action will be taken against those who resorted to violence.
Cabinet to take up proposal to extend operation & maintenance contracts from 9 to 29 years
To deal with the chaos at toll plazas arising out of the government's junking Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 notes, the government has suspended fee collection on all booths at National Highways till the midnight of November 11.
Most of these road contracts are spread across Andhra Pradesh, Haryana, Karnataka, Odisha, Rajasthan, Tamil Nadu, Uttarakhand and West Bengal, with the government struggling to restart them.
Larsen & Toubro Ltd has secured a contract from National Highways Authority of India for constructing a six-lane dedicated flyover on National Highways No 1 (NH1) in Haryana at an estimated cost of Rs 418 crore.
Machinery and manpower have been deployed, but stones falling from the hills are obstructing the road opening work, the officials said.
The minister expressed hope that toll operators will respond to his call positively. Earlier, Gadkari had asked NHAI to suspend toll on all national highways to ease transportation of essential goods and supplies.
Though some operators offer the facility of tag lanes, such tags can only be used at designated points.
The National Highways Authority of India will this year witness the highest ever growth out of the last decade. But Gadkari himself admits his biggest failure as India's roads minister has been his inability to curb loss of life in road accidents.
They said the incident occurred around 4 am when a 150-metre-long portion of the four-and-a-half-kilometer-long tunnel collapsed.
'Some districts have said that areas which are away from the urban centres and where there have been minimal to zero Covid-19 cases may be exempted from the lockdown and construction activity should be allowed,' said a person in the know.
Public-sector banks, including Canara Bank and Bank of India, are tapping the infrastructure bond market. Canara Bank on Tuesday raised Rs 10,000 crore at a coupon rate of 7.40 per cent through 10-year infrastructure bonds. This comes after SBI on July 10 raised Rs 10,000 crore also through infrastructure bonds with a 15-year tenor at a coupon rate of 7.36 per cent.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Friday flagged off two specially designed Vande Bharat trains between Katra town and Srinagar city, reducing travel time between the two places by two to three hours and ensuring all-weather surface connectivity with the Kashmir valley.
Senior Congress leader Shashi Tharoor welcomed the extradition of Tahawwur Hussain Rana, a key accused in the 26/11 case, and said everyone associated with the conspiracy of the Mumbai terror attacks must face the court of justice. He described Rana's extradition as a "step forward for justice." Rana, a Pakistan-born Canadian national and close associate of David Coleman Headley, is being brought to India after his last-ditch attempt to evade extradition failed. Tharoor expressed hope that the interrogation of Rana would provide more details about the Mumbai attacks and said he was "very glad" that Indian authorities managed to get Rana's custody.
The Punjab and Haryana high court Tuesday issued notices to the Centre, and the states of Haryana and Punjab, on two separate petitions filed pertaining to the farmers' Delhi Chalo march.
The restructuring exercise of the NHAI includes increasing the number of part-time members of the authority from the existing two to six, who would be from non-government sector. It also includes appointment of six full-time members, against five at present, one each for finance, administration, public private partnership, two members for projects and one for technical.
Maharashtra Congress leader and former Lok Sabha MP Milind Deora has demanded a Central Bureau of Investigation probe into Rs 12,000 crore spent by Mumbai's civic body on road works between 2017 and 2022.
As even bigger road construction players are not willing to bet on BOT projects., NHAI will have to rethink its thrust on the BOT model.
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