Peeved by the dismal performance of road construction target last fiscal, the Centre has now cleared the major bottleneck by de-linking environment clearance from forest.
This major decision has now paved the way for launch of 20 stalled road projects worth Rs27,000 crore investments by the Road Transport and Highways Ministry (MoRTH).
“The Cabinet Committee on Infrastructure nod to de-link both the clearances has come as a major relief to the Ministry which is facing problems in award of projects and is a welcome step,” said a MoRTH. The CCI on Thursday announced that major bottlenecks impeding the growth of highways sector, including delinking environment clearance from forest nod, have been cleared.
Earlier, forest clearance was mandatory before start of work on stretches falling in forest and non-forest areas. The Supreme Court in March had allowed modification in norms to delink environment clearance from forest. A road project can now begin once it gets environment approval.
According to a MoRTH official, CCI also gave nod to enhance the ceiling of 4,000 km of four laning in NHDP Phase-IV to 8,000 km on Build, Operate and Transfer (BOT) (Toll) mode, based on the traffic justification according to the Indian Road Congress code. The highways sector has been battling problems like equity crunch, delays in clearances and land acquisition besides major players abandoning projects mid-way.
Earlier, GVK Power and Infrastructure had announced termination of its contract with NHAI for building Rs 7,500 crore major highway Shivpuri-Dewas Expressway in Madhya Pradesh. Another firm GMR Infrastructure had cancelled its contract with authority for building Kishangarh-Udaipur- Ahmedabad highway.