Highways and Roads

1. National Highways The Central Government is responsible for the development and maintenance of the National Highways System. The National Highways of India have been shown in Fig. 12.1. The total length of the National Highways in 2010 was 70,548 km. The Ministry is carrying out development and maintenance work of the National Highways through three agencies: (i) the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI), (ii) the State Public Works Department (I’WD), and (iii) the Border Road Organisation (BRO).

In order to give boost to the economic development of the country, the Government has embarked upon massive National Highways Development Projects (NHDP) being implemented by the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI). Some of the important National Highways Projects under progress are given below:

Golden Quadrilateral (GQ) The National Highways Development Project (NHDP) has taken up a massive programme of road building in the country. Launched in January 1999, the Golden Quadrilateral Project is perhaps one of the largest projects of road building in the country (Fig. 12.2). The project is being implemented by the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI). The National Highways Development Project has the following components:

(i) Phase I—Golden Quadrilateral: This phase comprises connecting Delhi-Mumbai, Chennai, and Kolkata-Delhi by six-lane super highways. It has a total length of 5846 km. The four sides of the quadrilateral have varying length. The side of the quadrilaterals between Delhi and Mumbai is 1419 km long, Mumbai to Chennai 1290 km long, Chennai to Kolkata 1684 km long, and Kolkata to Delhi 1453 km.

(i) The North South Corridor. This corridor aims to connect the National Highways from Srinagar (J & K) to Kanniyakumari including Kochi-Salem; and

(ii) Hie East West Corridor: This corridor aims to connect the National Highways from Silchar in Assam to Porbandar in Gujarat (Fig. 12.2).

standard. Thus to connect state capitals, seaports, and the important tourist locations with the Golden Quadrilateral.

Traditionally, the road projects used to be financed by the government. But in the last decade after the liberalisation or globalisation, a significant contribution is being made by the private sector. To encourage the private sector, several steps, given below, have been taken by the government.

1. Declaration of the road sector as an industry.

2. Provision of capital subsidy up to 40 per cent of the project cost to make project commercially viable.

Fig- 12.2 National Highways Development Project

project.

4. Provision of encumbrance free site work, i.e., the Government shall meet all expenses relating to land and other pre-construction activities.

5. Foreign direct investment upto 100 per cent in road sector.

6. Easier external commercial borrowing norms.

7. Higher concession period (upto 30 years).

8. Right to collect and retain toll.

2. State Highways The length of state Highway is 128,000 Km (2010). The State Highways and Rural Roads are developed and maintained by the various agencies of the state and union territories. The funds, however, are also provided by the Central Government for the development of roads under the following schemes.

(a) Improvement of State Roads from the CRF: The funds from the CRF are provided for improvement of state roads other than the rural roads.

(b) Economic importance and Inter State Connectivity Scheme. To promote inter-state facilities and also to assist the state governments in their economic development through construction of roads bridges of inter-state and economic importance, the Central Government provides 100 per cent grant for inter-state connectivity projects and 50 per cent for projects of economic importance.

(c) Rural Roads: Roads are also being developed in rural areas under the Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojna (PMGSY). The objective of this scheme is to link all the villages with a population of more than 500 with all weather roads by the end 2007,

3. District Roads These roads mostly connect the towns and large villages with one another and with the district headquarters. The construction and maintenance of roads is the responsibility of the Zila Parishad and the PWD. The length of major district roads is 4,70,000 km.

4. Village Roads Village roads are constructed and maintained by the village panchay ats. These roads are generally, narrow and zig-zag. They are generally not suitable for heavy mechanised traffic. The length of rural roads is 26,50,000 km.

5. International Highways Under the agreement with the Economic and Social Commission on Asia and Pacific (ESCAP) some of the country’s highways linking neighbouring countries have been declared international highways. These highways are of two types:

(a) The Main Arterial Routes, linking the capitals of the neighbouring countries like (i) Lahore-Amritsar-Delhi-Agra-Kolkata-Golaghat-Imphal- Mandalay (Myanmar), (ii) Agra Gwalior Ilyderabad-Bangalore-Dhanushkodi, and (iii) Barhi-Kathmandu;

(b) The routes joining the main cities, seaports, and industrial centres with the arterial road-network, like (i) Agra-Mumbai Road, (ii) Delhi- Multan Road, (iii) Bangalore-Chennai Road, and (iv) Golaghat-Ledo Road.

The World Bank provides funds for the maintenance of these roads.

6. Express Highways These are multi lane well-paved highways used for movement ol goods and traffic. Some of the important express highways are

(i) Kolkata-Dum-Dum Airport Highway, (ii) Durgapur-Kolkata Express Highway, and (iii) Mumbai-Pune Express Highway.

Some of the important National Highways have been shown in Fig. 12.1 and Fig. 12.2 while Table 12.1 gives their routes and length in kilometres.