Bundelkhand Expressway: Prime Minister Narendra Modi has laid the foundation stone for the 296-kilometres long Bundelkhand Expressway in UP’s Chitrakoot. The new Bundelkhand Expressway project will be a next-generation infrastructure boost for the state of Uttar Pradesh. The four-lane expressway is likely to be expandable to six-lane in the coming years. Once the development work on this project is completed, the Bundelkhand Expressway in UP will provide seamless passage to the national capital. A statement from the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) stated that the proposed expressway project will be supplementing the nodes of the Uttar Pradesh Defence Industrial Corridor announced in the month of February 2018 by the government.
Bundelkhand Expressway: Route, project details
The state government of Uttar Pradesh is implementing the Bundelkhand Expressway project, which will pass through the districts of Chitrakoot, Hamirpur, Banda and Jalaun. The expressway project will connect the Bundelkhand area to the national capital, New Delhi through the Yamuna Expressway and the Agra-Lucknow Expressway.
The ambitious expressway project will start from Jhansi in UP and it will pass through the lesser developed districts of the state such as Chitrakoot, a well known religious and tourist spot, Banda, Auraiya, Hamirpur as well as Jalaun.
From Jalaun, the Bundelkhand Expressway will be linked to Etawah and reach Naseempur through Bateshwar in Agra district before joining the Agra-Lucknow Expressway.
In a bid to give a necessary boost to the construction of the Bundelkhand Expressway, the state government of Uttar Pradesh had accelerated the land acquisition process.
Last year, the UP state Cabinet had approved building the Bundelkhand Expressway project which would cost around Rs 10,000 crore.
According to an FE report, if the companies awarded the contract for Bundelkhand Expressway are able to complete the work in 30 months from the date of signing the MoUs, they will get an incentive of 5%.
The deadline for the completion of the expressway work is 36 months, and if that is missed the companies will be fined.
The Bundelkhand Expressway work has been divided into six phases. The construction for the first and the second phase will be handled by M/s APCO Infratech. Ashoka Buildcon will handle the third phase, Gawar Construction the fourth and fifth phase, and Dilip Buildcon the sixth phase, FE reported last year.
Last year, Shrikant Sharma, Uttar Pradesh government spokesman said that the upcoming Bundelkhand Expressway project is expected to help 50,000 people get direct as well as indirect jobs. With the implementation of this project, the state tourism will get a boost and also, it will bring in the holistic development of the state.
