NEW DELHI: The road transport and highways ministry is planning to take up the construction and maintenance of national highway stretches directly rather than giving the tasks to public works departments (PWDs), a move that may lead to a face-off between the Centre and states.
At present, around 63,000-odd km of the 1.45 lakh km NH network is managed by central govt agencies NHAI and NHIDCL, while the remaining 60% is managed by state PWDs on behalf of the ministry.
The ministry gets the development and maintenance of around 80,000 km of NHs done by PWDs. It funds such works and pays agency charges to PWDs. Most of these NHs are two-lane roads or two-lane with paved shoulders.
TOI has learnt that the fresh move is aimed at speeding up construction and better maintenance. They added that the plan is to bring NH networks with PWDs of only a few states directly under the ministry. “This will be done only in the case of states where the pace of construction and award is very slow. This will not be applicable for all states,” a source said.
For this, it plans to set up project units for different stretches that would be taken up for widening. States such as Karnataka and Punjab may be the first few to be brought under this scheme of things.
But sources said this may face backlash as states play a key role in land acquisition and forest clearances, the two most important pre-conditions for a project to take off and its completion. “If states don’t provide enough support, we won’t be able to execute wider highway and expressway projects, as these require fresh land acquisition. Only time will tell how the move will play out and how states would take it,” an official said.
At present, the maximum construction and award of highway stretch come from roads managed by state PWDs.
