The first project under Bharatmala is expected to be awarded by the end of next year as the land acquisition process and detailed project reports for the mega scheme are underway and award of the contract would take place once these aspects are finalised.
Union Transport Minister Nitin Gadkari said the project award would take place in the later half of 2018 and the government is hopeful that the scheme would elicit a great response from the private sector.
The Union Cabinet on Tuesday cleared the Bharatmala project to construct 20,000 km of highways connecting western and eastern parts of the country at an estimated price of Rs 7 lakh crore. In the first phase which will be undertaken for over three to five years, the project would cost Rs 5.5 lakh crore. The average cost of constructing one km of road is Rs 13 crore.
The project would be funded through various sources, including Rs 2.09 lakh crore from the market, Rs 1.06 lakh crore through private investment, and Rs 2.19 lakh crore from the Central Road Fund or toll collection.
The roads that would be built under Bharatmala will include state highways, national highways, and some state roads across the country.
Bharatmala is the second-largest highways project after National Highway Development Programme (NHDP) that saw the development of about 50,000 km, and aims at improving the connectivity in border and other areas.
The project that was first mooted in April 2015 aims to connect Gujarat and Rajasthan, then move to Punjab and cover Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand followed by Uttar Pradesh and Bihar and further to Sikkim, Assam, Arunachal Pradesh, and right up to the Indo-Myanmar border in Manipur and Mizoram.
The aim is to improve the speed of traffic flow on key corridors by providing uniform four-lane roads between two identified points. According to Manish B Agarwal, partner and leader, Infrastructure, PwC India, the programme with its focus on economic corridors would help ensure that investments are focussed on economic returns.
These corridors will permit faster movement of cargo vehicles. According to government estimates, construction of 10,000 km of highways annually has the potential of generating four crore man-days of work.
Bharatmala was proposed on the lines of Sagarmala in which a string of ports will be built in the Indian Ocean to protect maritime interests. The government plans to improve road connectivity not just to coastal and border areas but also backward areas.
