Mohandas Pai Committee on roads and ports to submit preliminary report in a month: Nitin Gadkari

NEW DELHI: A 10-member Mohandas Pai Committee formed by the government for carrying out technology initiatives for roads, highways and ports sectors would submit its preliminary report within one month's time, said Nitin Gadkari, Union Minister for Shipping, Road Transport and Highways on Wednesday.

"We have assigned Mr Mohandas Pai the work to see how e-governance mechanism can lead to good governance in both our departments and what will be the e-solutions and e-recommendations for the same," said Gadkari, while inaugurating a national conference on ‘Ports & Shipping @2020,’ organised by the Associated Chambers of Commerce and Industry of India (ASSOCHAM).

The task force formed under the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways will work on new strategies under a four-year plan to ensure that technology remains at the core of every major road and transport initiative as part of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Digital India vision, ET reported on Wednesday.

Other members of the task force include former IT secretary for Andhra Pradesh, Sanjay Jaju; Abhijit Purushottam Desai, partner at Ekam Consulting; Prashant Pole, director at Disha Consultants; and Girish Srivastava, a policy and strategy consultant.

Infosys’ former Chief Financial Officer Pai is studying National Highways Authority of India, the transport ministry’s new corporation for North-East, Ministry for Surface Transport, Shipping and Ports, Gadkari said.

"We have submitted a bill in the Parliament to convert 101 important rivers to inland waterways and hopefully it would be passed in the current session," the minister added.

He further said that the government is working on war-footing to increase efficiency at existing ports through e-governance, implementing software packages and also by carrying out best practices and standards followed globally.

Gadkari also asked the private sector to take ports and shipping sector "seriously", and encouraged them to set up dry ports at various states including Punjab, Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Jammu and Kashmir, Uttarakhand, Himachal Pradesh and Rajasthan.