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Minister seeks cooperation of States to expedite highway projects

By Our Special Correspondent

NEW DELHI JULY 14. The Union Minister for Road Transport and Highways, B.C. Khanduri, today made an appeal to the States to extend greater cooperation in speeding up land acquisition and widening of more than 13,000 km of national highways under the National Highways Development Project.

Addressing the meeting of the Parliamentary Consultative Committee attached to his Ministry, Maj. Gen. (retd.) Khanduri listed the problems which were affecting the Golden Quadrilateral project and where the assistance of the States was crucial.

He said some of the States had not acquired the required land in time.

He mentioned Tamil Nadu and Maharashtra and said these States were still to hand over nearly 60 per cent of the land required for execution of the project.

Delay in grant of quarry contracts, law and order problems created by local people, court delays, removal of structures on land needed for widening the highways, the long time taken in approval of design and grant for construction of railway over bridges, besides bad performance of some Indian and foreign contractors and external funding companies stipulating long period for pre-construction and construction activities were other problems afflicting the highway projects.

Reiterating the commitment of the Government to adhere to the schedules for completion, he said effective steps had been taken.

Introduction of bonus and penalty clauses in civil work contracts, frequent meetings with officials in States and invoking the intervention of the Chief Ministers were helping in overcoming the hurdles.

The Minister said the States had been requested to nominate senior personnel as nodal officers for coordination and all project sites had been connected to headquarters by the Internet for monitoring the progress on daily and weekly basis.

Providing details about the progress made so far, he said most of the works had been awarded.

The only stretch of the GQ that was yet to be awarded was the 84 km GQ Allahabad Bypass.

Mr. Khanduri also took over the additional charge of the Ministry of Urban Development and Poverty Alleviation.

He had a meeting with senior officials who briefed him on the functioning of the Ministry.

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