The 296-km-long Bundelkhand Expressway along with 12 other expressways in various stages of construction and running a length of over 3,200 km are set to transform the connectivity in Uttar Pradesh.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi will formally inaugurate the Bundelkhand Expressway on July 16.
The Bundelkhand Expressway, which commences at Chitrakoot and links with Agra-Lucknow Expressway at Etawah, has been completed eight months ahead of its schedule.
While laying the foundation stone of this expressway in February 2020, Modi had said that the project “will create thousands of jobs and connect the common people with facilities available in bigger cities”. UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath, on July 11, had made a physical inspection of the expressway at its inauguration site in Jalaun district.
The expressway starts near Bharatkoop in Chitrakoot district and merges with the Agra-Lucknow Expressway near Kudrail village in Etawah district. It covers seven districts of Chitrakoot, Banda, Mahoba, Hamirpur, Jalaun, Auraiya and Etawah. The expressway has crossings over several rivers -- Bagen, Ken, Shyama, Chandawal, Birma, Yamuna, Betwa and Sengar.
The four-lane expressway, developed by Uttar Pradesh Expressways Industrial Development Authority (UPEIDA) has scope for expansion to six lanes in the future. It has 13 interchange points.
According to officials, the total cost of the project is estimated to be about Rs 15,000 crore. However, the Yogi Adityanath government has saved about Rs 1,132 crore by opting for e-tendering.
The project is expected to give a fillip to connectivity in UP and boost economic activity.
“Bundelkhand, which is considered to be the most backward and parched region of the state, is set to be directly connected to the national capital through the Agra-Lucknow Expressway and Yamuna Expressway.
The Bundelkhand Expressway is expected to reduce travel time between Delhi and Chitrakoot to just six hours from the 9-10 hours earlier.
The Bundelkhand Expressway is also crucial to the success of the upcoming UP defence manufacturing corridor project. Work on an industrial corridor has also started in the districts of Banda and Jalaun. The defence manufacturing corridor project, worth Rs 20,000 crore, has been planned over 5,071 hectares across the state’s western, central and Bundelkhand regions.
UP has become the first state in the country to have 13 expressways. Of the 13 expressways spanning 3,200 km, six are operational while work is underway on seven. Industrial corridors are being built along the highways and expressways. Airstrips are coming up for emergency use by the Indian Air Force.
“Not even two expressways had been completed in UP in the first 70 years since Independence. With a series of expressways, including the Delhi-Meerut Expressway, the present government in UP has fulfilled a decades-old demand of the people of NCR (National Capital Region) and western UP,” said a UP government official.
“There is also the 594-km-long Ganga Expressway, the foundation stone of which has been laid by the prime minister,” he added.
The existing expressway network in UP include Yamuna Expressway (165 km), Noida-Greater Noida Expressway (25 km), Agra-Lucknow Expressway (302 km), Delhi-Meerut Expressway (96 km), Purvanchal Expressway (341 km) and Bundelkhand Expressway (296 km). The total length of the expressways is 1,225 km.
The expressways under various stages of construction are Gorakhpur Link Expressway (91 km), Ganga Expressway (594 km), Lucknow-Kanpur Expressway (63 km), Ghaziabad-Kanpur Expressway (380 km), Gorakhpur-Siliguri Expressway (519 km), Delhi-Saharanpur-Dehradun Expressway (210 km) and Ghazipur-Ballia-Manjhighat Expressway (117 km). The total length of these expressways is 1,974 km.