Govt okays Rs 41k cr, 6-lane highways

NEW DELHI: The government has approved six-laning of 6,500 km of national highways, including 5,700 km of Golden Quadrilateral (GQ), at a cost of Rs 41,210 crore. As of now, these are primarily four-laned highways.

Of the total cost of Rs 41,210 crore, Rs 35,692 crore will be borne by the private sector and the balance amount of Rs 5,518 crore as viability gap, cost of land acquisition, utility shifting and consultancy to be borne by the government. A decision to this effect was taken by the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) here
on Thursday.

Six-laning 5,700 km of the Golden Quadrilateral and 800 km of other sections of national highways falls under phase V of National Highways Development Programme (NHDP).“The projects would be taken up on build-operate-transfer (BOT) mode following a design-build-finance-operate (DBFO) pattern, with a maximum of 10% viability gap funding,” finance minister P Chidambaram said after the CCEA meeting.

The cost of projects under NHDP phase V has been estimated at Rs 6.34 crore per km comprising Rs 5.78 crore per km for construction and Rs 0.56 crore per km for land acquisition, utilities and consultancy, the minister added.