Bhubaneswar: With the constant monitoring by the state government, the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) has set a target to build National Highways (NHs) of a total length of 193 km by end of March this year.
This was discussed at the review meeting under Chief Secretary Asit Tripathy here at Lok Seva Bhawan, recently.
The NHAI has set a target to construct a stretch of 366 km of NH during the financial year 2019-20 with a total investment of about Rs 20,000 crore. Of which, 173 km have been completed with utilisation of around Rs 1651 crore so far. The Chief Secretary asked the NHAI officials to expedite construction works through constant monitoring of the contract agreements so that the target can be achieved.
Presenting details of the projects, the NHAI chief general manager (Odisha) Ramprasad Panda said that no issue relating to the projects is pending with the state government.
Panda said that at present, 5,753 km of national highway roads are there in the state out of which 1912 km are under the administrative control of NHAI and 2935 km are under State Works department. Additional 906 km of roads in the state have been declared as national highway and they would be soon be entrusted either to NHAI or to the state soon, he said.
According to review, presently around 22 upgrading projects including 4-laning, 6-laning, flyover and bridge projects are under implementation in the state. It includes four-laning of the Panikoili-Rimuli section of NH 215 (New NH-20).
While presenting the status of the NH project, Panda apprised the members that there was 95 per cent physical progress in the work. Out of the total stretch of around 166 km, 4-laning was completed in 152 km and two-laning was completed in 14 km.
The balance work included around 7 km of carriage way, three bridges, one elephant under-pass and around nine km of service roads, the NHAI—CGM out. Panda said that the problems would be resolved soon and the balance work would be completed expeditiously.
“A new mega NH project—running from Raipur through Vishakhpatnam—is in the pipeline. Around 240 km of this project will run through the districts of Nabrangpur and Koraput. This will be a green-field 6-lane project in Odisha,” he added.