Foundation stones laid for Rs 1 lakh-crore Delhi-Mumbai, Dwarka expressways; projects to create 50 lakh man-day of employment

New Delhi: Union ministers Sushma Swaraj, Arun Jaitley and Nitin Gadkari Friday laid the foundation stones for two high-speed highway corridors – Rs 90,000 crore Delhi-Mumbai Expressway and Rs 9,000 crore Dwarka Expressway here. The ministers also dedicated the Rs 1,217 crore Jaipur Ring Road to the nation. The Dwarka Expressway, once completed, will open newer avenues for industrial development in the entire region, Finance Minister Jaitley said at the event. These expressways will improve overall development, he added. Road Transport and Highways Minister Gadkari said his ministries had undertaken works worth about Rs 15 lakh crore in the last five years. The greenfield Delhi-Mumbai Expressway will be India’s longest expressway at 1,320 km and would reduce the travel time between the metropolises to 13 hours from the present 24 hours, he said. [caption id=“attachment_5011621” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] Representational image. Getty images[/caption] Gadkari said the expressway will be completed in three years and has the potential to generate 50 lakh man-days of employment during construction. The expressway will pass through underdeveloped areas and about 15,000 hectares of land is being acquired for it at an estimated cost of Rs 25,000 crore, he added. In line with Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Digital India vision, all transactions related to land acquisition, including transfer of compensation to landowners, are being done digitally. “Delhi-Mumbai will be India’s most environment-friendly expressway with a tree cover of 20 lakh trees and rainwater harvesting system at every 500 metres,” Gadkari said. The expressway has taken a record time-frame of less than one year from conceptualisation to award, with 148.5 km of works already awarded and a further 400 km to be awarded this month, he said. The remaining 800 km will be awarded in the next six months. The Delhi-Mumbai national corridor (NH-8 section of the Golden Quadrilateral) is one of the busiest and most critical routes of the national highways network, witnessing an average traffic of more than 80,000 passenger car units (PCUs) per day. Considering the present traffic scenario, it was decided to develop an alternative alignment connecting Delhi with Vadodara, which on linking up with the proposed Vadodara-Mumbai Expressway would create seamless connectivity between Delhi and Mumbai. The Delhi-Vadodara-Mumbai expressway would result in overall reduction of about 150 km in the present distance between Delhi-Mumbai, Gadkari said. The Delhi-Vadodara Expressway, part of the Delhi-Mumbai Expressway project, will be implemented at a cost of Rs 45,000 crore. The Vadodara-Mumbai Expressway part will also be executed at a cost of Rs 45,000 crore. The Dwarka Expressway is 29 km long, out of which 18.9 km will fall in Haryana and 10.1 km in Delhi. It will be developed in four packages. It is also proposed to provide western connectivity to Indira Gandhi International Airport from Dwarka side. It will also provide direct access to the upcoming Exhibition-Cum-Convention Centre (ECC) in Sector 25 of Dwarka. The Dwarka Expressway will be an eight-lane highway with provision of three-lane service roads on either side. Union ministers Mansukh L Mandaviya, Rajyavardhan Singh Rathore and Rao Indrajit Singh were also present on the occasion, along with Haryana Chief Minister Manohar Lal Khattar and BJP MP Manoj Tiwari.