Regardless of the country being 2nd largest road network in the globe, a steady requirement for the network to develop and bring more number of roads to the Indian road network. This is necessary to be done if we require connecting the ever-growing residents of the nation.
Simultaneously, as was clear when the US underwent the crippling financial melancholy of somewhere decades back, there is not anything like making roads to offer an occupation and to catalyze the fiscal growth.
With the intention of deal with this and additional problems linked to the same, ‘India’s Road Ahead’ conference will be organized by Free Press Journal-Moneycontrol.com on December 9, 2017, from 9 am onwards. The keynote address at this conference will be delivered by the Union minister for Road Transport and Highways, Shipping and Water Resources, River Development and Ganga Rejuvenation, Nitin Gadkari.
By the NHAI data, the Indian road network covers near about 33 lakh kilometers (km) with the rustic and other roads adding over 26 lakh kilometers. This is followed by the state highways, district roads, expressways and national highways. At present, the National highways, which some years back accounted for near about 55,000-70,000 kilometers out of 3.5 million kilometers of road construction in the country has been stretched out to report for almost 2 lakh Kilometers. This specific thing has happened as the highways that used to be owned by a particular territory have now been ruled by the central government.
The ‘CMD’ of ‘IRB Infrastructure Developers Ltd,’ Virendra D Mhaiskar stated that “The sector seems to be in aggressive mode and given due focus, as the Government has come up with several ambitious projects under various schemes. However, the key challenge will be funding for the projects as present focus on certain models like HAM and EPC will not generate adequate funding; and on the contrary, may financially burden the Government. In that case, there would be no option but to go back to BOT and TOT models and invite private investments and partnering with foreign funds, which would be a great opportunity for developers as well as a sigh of relief for Government as it would not have to spend.”
Gadkari, on his recent keynote address at a conference on tunneling arranged by the MIT-WPU matter, stated that “the ministry is building near about 20 tunnels in Jammu & Kashmir within the duration of two years. The minister also discussed how these road development plans would work as an employment opening for the qualified and deserving scholars in the town.
Giving out his views about the involvement of Indian road network sector in employment, the senior partner in McKinsey’s Mumbai, Rajat Gupta stated that “In past 2-3 years, the road network has experienced an incredible boost together with creating sufficient employment opportunities for the residents.