NEW DELHI: The first SPV of NHAI for financing the Delhi-Mumbai Expressway project has raised Rs 9,731 crore this year from four banks with the largest share of Rs 5,000 crore coming from State Bank of India. The other three banks are Punjab National Bank, Bank of Maharashtra and Axis Bank.
The project will soon tie-up with other institutions for the balance debt requirement of Rs 38,733 crore, an NHAI official said. The National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) has set up the fully owned Delhi-Mumbai Expressway Developers Ltd (DMEL) in its bid to bring in greater financial discipline by raising debt at the SPV (Special Purpose Vehicle) level instead of at NHAI level.
Earlier, when NHAI used to raise the debt at the authority level, it could spend money in all projects, both financially viable and unviable stretches. Sources said now under this mechanism, the debt raised for viable projects will be invested in such works while the less viable projects would be executed using budgetary allocation.
The highways authority plans to set up similar SPVs or bring more expressway projects under the DMEL to raise adequate finance for construction of such stretches.
