Mr. Nitin Gadkari, India’s Minister of Road Transport and Highways, introduced the Bharatmala Project Pariyojana to upgrade the nation’s transit system. Except for perhaps the government’s fiscal assistance, the program’s budget would be handled by a cess upon petrol and diesel, and even a fee gathered at toll plazas.
Candidates studying for the UPSC 2022 exam should familiarise themselves with governmental programs to succeed in the next UPSC exams.
Table of Contents
Elements of the Bharatmala Project
Economic Corridor – The national government would build 9000 kilometers of Economic Corridors by the road development program’s criteria.
- Feeder Channel or Inner Corridor – The Feeder Channel or Inner Corridor classification encompasses a staggering 6000 kilometers of roadway.
- Nationwide Corridor Efficiency Enhancement – 5000km of roads built underneath the project will indeed be classified as National Corridors to enhance road connectivity.
- Border Roads and Worldwide Connections – To link towns and distant places in border territories, the initiative has budgeted for the construction of 2000 kilometers of Border Highway and Worldwide Connectivity roadways.
- Ports Connections and Coastal Highway – The national government had authorized the development of 2000 kilometers of highways to link the regions sprinkled around the shorelines with significant ports.
- Balance NHDP Works – The program’s final section would involve the building and upkeep of around 10,000 kilometers of new highways.
Approximately 26,200 km of Industrial Passageways or pathways with substantial freight traffic have been discovered by the initiative. The Bharatmala project program is to build the specified Economic Passageways with substantial freight movement from beginning to end to provide seamless, quick transport and standardization. To solve the infrastructural asymmetry which occurs in several places, Feeder Corridors would be created.
An authorized Project Analysis & Technological Scrutiny Council to be established at the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI), as well as the Department of Motor Transportation and Highways, would assess all initiatives undertaken within Bharatmala upon a technological, fiscal, and economic basis (MoRTH).
Bharatmala Pariyojana’s characteristics
The system was created to boost road congestion and commerce by using vehicle transit. The Bharatmala Pariyojana also has the following characteristics:
- The major goal was to strengthen road conditions to spur prosperity in all corners of the nation.
- Another major component of the announcements for this program is the development of modern roadways.
- The authority intends to complete the building of all roadways underneath this initiative within five years.
- Because the administration’s funding for road building might well be insufficient, the Department must rely on a variety of different resources to complete this project.
- The Bharatmala project program intends to build many roads, and indeed the Government has opted to split into numerous divisions to ensure that the roads are built properly.
The Bharatmala Program’s Difficulties
The Bharatmala project initiative was proposed in 2017 with a completion date of 2022. Although, according to recent reports, the proposal is presently nowhere near finishing due to rising land costs plus a rise in the program’s planned spending.
The national government nowadays is searching for additional expenditures from money markets as much as any additional private investments. If the plan is not fulfilled, the administration plans to auction finished roadway works or look for international debt or bond yields.
The Bharatmala Route.
The ministry intends to raise funding for Bharatmala in four ways:
- Market borrowings.
- Central road fund.
- Monetizing government-owned road assets.
- Budgetary allocation.
A sum of Rs. 2 lakh crore would be funded as debts through marketplace borrowings, with the remaining Rs. 1 lakh crore coming via the National Road Funds plus NHAI toll receipts.
By extending the number of passageways from 6 to 50, this initiative would aid the nation’s financial progress. With the Bharatmala Programme, the National Ministry hopes to boost trade, enhance the quality of life of Major Highways, plus expand the country’s road infrastructure.
Phase 1 of the Bharatmala program.
The Bharatmala project Pariyojana Phase 1 was authorized by the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) in October 2017. A sum of 34,800 kilometers of the roadway would be constructed during Phase 1. A total of 571 infrastructural initiatives totaling 19,785 kilometers have already been sanctioned within Phase I of the Bharatmala Pariyojana to date. Such initiatives will cost Rs 593,820 crores to complete.
Phase 1 of the Bharatmala highways:
- Business passageways (9,000 km).
- Feeder and inter-corridor pathways (6,000 km).
- National Corridors Efficiency Program (NCEP) roads (5,000 km).
- Routes that link the United States and Canada to the rest of the world (2,000 km).
- Routes connecting the coast with ports (2,000 km).
- Highways and expressways (800 km).
- National Highway Development Program (NHDP) expressways (10,000 km).
Bharatmala Pariyojana Phase-I would be seeing expressways constructed.
The administration would build the following motorways and access restricted pathways as part of the Bharatmala Pariyojana Phase-I:
- The Delhi-Vadodara Motorway
- Dholera-Ahmedabad Highway
- Amritsar-Katra Expressway.
- The Bengaluru-Chennai Highway
- The Kanpur-Lucknow Motorway
- The Ambala-Kotputli Passageway
- Urban Extension Road II.
- The Delhi-Dehradun Circuit
- Bengaluru-Satellite Ring Road
- Solapur-Surat-Ahmednagar
- The Solapur-Kurnool Highway
- The Kharagpur-Siliguri Passageway (Till Morgram).
The present condition of the Bharatmala project is 2021.
Although the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) had hoped to complete roadway infrastructure by 2022, due to land acquisitions challenges, expense overruns, and numerous rounds of the Coronavirus epidemic, development on the Bharatmala program Phase 1 is expected to be postponed by four years. The authorities announced in October 2020 when Phase 1 had completed 2,921 kilometers of roadways.
Progress on Phase 1 could be finished by FY 2026, as per rating agencies ICRA if all work agreements are issued by FY 2023.
The price of creating Bharatmala Phase 1 has been originally anticipated to be Rs 5.35 lakh crores, but it had now risen to Rs 8.5 lakh crores, owing to difficulties in land procurement.
Phase 2 of the Bharatmala plan.
The NHAI has indeed begun preparing for Stage 2 of the Bharatmala initiative, comprising 5,000 kilometers of infrastructure to be constructed inside the second stage.
Job generation is a goal of the Bharatmala initiative.
As an outcome of increasing economic activities throughout India, the initiative is estimated to produce almost 22 million occupations & 100 million man working days.
The Bharatmala initiative has received funding.
The Bharatmala project Pariyojana is a centralized government roadway and motorways project that is financed by a variety of methods, involving budgetary allocations, corporate investments, loan funding, and indeed the toll-operator-transfer mechanism, among others.
Within Bharatmala, companies are in charge of the building.
The program’s completion has been handed to the National Highways Authority of India, the National Highway as well as the Commercial Development Commission, and state civil affairs agencies.
Current updates about the Bharatmala Pariyojana.
In Phase 1 of the Bharatmala initiative, the Nashik Road segment is included.
The 5.9-kilometer Dwarka Loop to Datta Mandir Chowk portion of the Nashik Route has been featured in Phase 1 of such Bharatmala initiative, according to expressway transportation and highways administrator Nitin Gadkari. Gadkari claimed the verdict should provide enormous comfort to everyday travelers connecting Nashik city and thus the Nashik Road train stations, which are divided by a seven-kilometer portion of the Nashik-Pune federal expressway, inside a Twitter post on August 19, 2021.
A flyover would be built from Dwarka Ring to Datta Mandir Chowk by the Department of Road Transportation and Highways to relieve traffic jams across Nashik Highway. Massive automobiles could pass all across town using the flyover linking the two places, according to Nashik MP Hemant Tukaram Godse.
In Bharatmala Phase-I, the MP’s Atal Headway initiative is included.
On August 19, 2021, the Federal Road Transport Department authorized the incorporation of Madhya Pradesh’s Atal Progress-Way initiative in Phase 1 of such Bharatmala scheme. The Atal Progress-Way initiative, which is expected to spend Rs 7,000 crores, would indeed be constructed on 1,500 hectares of public land.
FAQs on the Bharatmala Initiative.
- Which Indian state has by far the most nationwide highways?
Ans. Uttar Pradesh boasts India’s most extensive infrastructure of nationwide highways. Throughout Uttar Pradesh, there seem to be 35 major highways.
- Which state seems to have the longest highway system?
Ans. Rajasthan, India’s biggest territory with a cumulative land area of 342,329 square kilometers, is a good choice for this list.
Rajasthan seems to be well-connected to the eastern, western, northern, and southern of India, with a total length of 6,373 km of Public Highways and even a transit system of 150,876 km.
- What is India’s longest highway?
Ans. National Highway 44 (NH 44), formerly referred to as National Highway 7, seems to be India’s longest nationwide expressway. It is 3,745 kilometers lengthy and runs through the NHDP’s North-South Route. It begins in the northern with Srinagar then finishes in the southward with Kanyakumari.
Conclusion
The Bharatmala project proposal aims to increase the performance of the National Corridor, which includes the Golden Quadrilateral and also the North, South, East, as well as West passageways, by revitalizing choke coordinates by building raised passageways, bypasses, ring motorways, lane advancement, and perhaps logistics parks at strategic locations.
The Bharatmala project management plan calls for the development of critical border highways and worldwide connecting roadways alongside international borders to increase commerce from Myanmar, Bangladesh, Bhutan, as well as Nepal.
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