On Thursday, Union Minister for Road Transport and Highways Nitin Gadkari announced that the government is working on 36 green express highways in the country to take the road network infrastructure to the next level.
Union Minister Nitin Gadkari said that in next 3-4 months, Bengaluru to Chennai will be reduced to just 2 hours from existing 6 hours. Mysuru to Bengaluru will be covered in just 1 hour from existing 3-3.5 hours. Meerut to Delhi has already been reduced to just 45 minutes, from earlier 4 hours.
Delhi to Jaipur journey will be completed in just 2 hours in the next 3-4 months while Delhi to Amritsar will be covered in 4 hours. In the next 2-3 months, Delhi to Dehradun which at present takes 9 hours will be reduced to just 2 hours.
The Union Minister said, “We are building Rs 6 lakh crore highways from Gorakhpur to Siliguri and Varanasi to Kolkata”. Gadkari revealed that a new highway is being aligned adjacent to the existing Mumbai-Pune highway that will reduce travel time between Mumbai-Bengaluru to just 5 hours.
Speaking about tunnels, Nitin Gadkari said that before the NDA government came to power, there were only 5 tunnels in Jammu and Kashmir but presently they are building 156 tunnels out of which 35-36 have been completed.
Manali to Rohtang Pass, which earlier used to take 3-3.5 hours following the construction of Atal Tunnel now takes only 8 minutes. Gadkari said that they are working on 7 new tunnels between Ladakh-Leh, the road construction work is underway.
The Asia’s longest Zojila Tunnel whose earlier cost of construction was estimated to Rs 12,000 crore is now being constructed in Rs 5,500 crore. Almost 75 per cent work has been done. In Jammu & Kashmir, the government is building 36 tunnels between Srinagar to Jammu out of which work on 22 have been completed. The work on Katra-Delhi Highway is also underway.
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