Ajit Pawar, who heads the Nationalist Congress Party, which is in an alliance with pro-Hindutva BJP and the Shiv Sena, noted Chief Ministers Mamata Banerjee (West Bengal), Chandrababu Naidu (Andhra Pradesh) and Nitish Kumar (Bihar) -- all secular politicians -- aligned with the BJP for the sake of development of their respective states.
'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.
The first-ever trial train to Kashmir took off for the Valley on Tuesday not on traditional tracks but on the 300 km-long Jammu-Srinagar national highway.
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.
The Bharti Kisan Union (Krantikari) has criticized the Punjab government for issuing arrest warrants against 25 farmers and adding an attempt to murder charge in the FIR related to the 2022 prime minister security breach incident. The union claims the farmers were protesting peacefully and had no knowledge of the prime minister's route. They argue the government is acting under pressure from the central government.
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 Border Roads Organisation have been asked to move out of the National Highway-16 project in Naxal-infested Maharashtra, Andhra Pradesh and Chattisgarh on 'as is where is basis' by March next year.
Government officials believe that central bridge projects perform better than state projects due to stricter checks and balances.
Zojila Pass, at a height of 11,516 feet above sea level, connects the picturesque Kashmir Valley with the cold Indus valley desert through the 434-km long Srinagar-Leh road.
Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister Omar Abdullah has said that India and Pakistan came closer to resolving the Kashmir issue during the Manmohan Singh-led UPA government. He added that he does not expect a return to that situation in his lifetime. Abdullah lauded Singh's efforts on Kashmir, including the setting up of working groups on the issue, and said he practically initiated measures for the return of displaced Kashmiri Pandits. The chief minister also praised Singh's contribution to India's economic development.
Once the scheme is implemented 70-80 per cent of the freight would move along national highways as against the current 40 per cent, says Highways Minister Nitin Gadkari.
While she primed up spending on infrastructure to create jobs and boost economic activity, Sitharaman did not tinker with income tax slabs or tax rates. Her Budget for the fiscal year beginning April 2022 proposed a massive 35 per cent jump in capital expenditure to Rs 7.5 lakh crore, coupled with rationalisation of customs duty, an extension of time for setting up new manufacturing companies and plans for starting a digital currency and tax crypto assets.
The NHAI project director and a retired army brigadier, who was running a consultancy service for NHAI, had been named by murdered NHAI engineer Satyendra Dubey in a letter alleging large-scale bungling in highway construction projects.
The Cabinet meeting and the holy dip comes on a day that marks the first anniversary of the consecration ceremony of the Ram temple in Ayodhya.
The 31st meeting of the Goods and Services Tax (GST) Council, held in December 2018, deferred a decision to reduce the GST rate for cement from 28 per cent to 18 per cent. This was despite recognising that cement - along with automobile parts - remained among the few mass-consumption items still taxed at the highest slab, which was originally meant for luxury and sin goods.
Syed Firdaus Ashraf/Rediff.com tracks Prime Minister Narendra Damodardas Modi's project-launching spree with just about three months to go for the assembly election in India's most populous state.
Apart from this, the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs also gave its approval for starting work on the fifth phase of the National Highway Development Programme.
The SHO said that Section 7 of the Anti-Terrorism Act had been included in the FIR, adding that the Chinese national would be presented before a court in Abbottabad.
Minister of State for External Affairs B Muraleedharan said India is committed to developing friendly and mutually beneficial relations with all its neighbours under its 'Neighbourhood First' policy.
'Despite the pandemic, we aspire to maintain the momentum of last year.'
A few weeks ago, when Road Transport & Highways Minister Nitin Gadkari launched an electronic toll-collection system on the Delhi-Mumbai highway, television channels reported live from toll plazas showing vehicles with radio frequency identification (RFID) tags in dedicated lanes that did not have to stop for paying cash.
The monthly Rs 2500 payment for poor women is expected to cost Rs 11,000 crore while the pension scheme of Rs 2000 for every senior citizen will cost around Rs 4100 crore. The Yamuna clean up will cost over Rs 10,000 crore while a similar amount is required to upgrade Delhi's hospitals. Ultimately, the new BJP government will have no choice but to ask the centre for financial support, notes Rashme Sehgal.
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.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi's dream project -- the Mumbai-Ahmedabad Bullet Train has been shown the green light with the formation of the company tasked with taking the project forward
The civil aviation ministry and Maharashtra have been planning an international airport near Pune for almost 10 years. The airport site would see construction from year 2011 onwards, if the land acquisition happens within a year.
China plans to build a new highway along the Line of Actual Control (LAC) with India as part of Beijing's efforts to strengthen its strategic position and project its power, a media report said on Wednesday.
The project, anchored by National Highways Authority of India in partnership with National Payments Corporation of India, is gaining momentum, with big banks such as ICICI and non-bank entities like Paytm have also entered the arena.
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.
An ambitious plan by the National Highways Authority of India to offer 126 road projects worth around Rs 1 lakh crore this year may face serious hurdles owing to a stiff clause introduced in the new Request for Qualification norms that will eliminate many bidders.
The National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) has been told to work on awarding contracts for around 100 projects, covering 11,151 km, over the financial year starting April 1.
A Pakistani anti-terrorism court has sent a Chinese national to jail on 14-day judicial remand on blasphemy charges in the restive Khyber Pakhtunkhwa province after he was arrested on Monday, according to media reports on Tuesday.
In a letter to the chief secretary, government of Uttarakhand, Union Power Secretary Alok Kumar said the land subsidence in Joshimath was a very old issue, dating back to 1976, and the construction of the 4x130 megawatt Tapovan Vishnugad project started only in 2006 by NTPC.
The government on Tuesday decided to set up a committee of secretaries to fast-track implementation of infrastructure projects along the border with China.
The report showed that 53 road accidents take place every hour in the country.
The national highways selected for upgrade include -- Gurgaon-Jaipur, Surat-Dahisar, Chilkaluripet-Vijaywada and Panipat-Jalandhar. These four stretches together measure about 838 km.
The government has launched another ambitious Rs 40,000 crore project to connect all major cities, not covered by NHDP, by four-lane highways.
