Cabinet may clear Delhi-Meerut expressway

NEW DELHI: The Union Cabinet is likely to clear the much awaited Delhi-Meerut expressway on Wednesday. This is one of the seven highway projects - all on the public-private-partnership (PPP) model -- entailing investment of over Rs 16,000 crore which will be taken up by the Narendra Modi Cabinet.
Sources said to ensure that the projects get bidders and works start, road transport minister Nitin Gadkari is likely to take it up with major developers when he meets them in near future."The real challenge is to get bidders and awarding the work," said a government official mentioning how the Eastern Peripheral Expressway project did not get a bidder.
Among the projects to be considered on Wednesday, Delhi-Meerut expressway is the biggest one with an estimated cost of Rs 7,800 crore. As per the proposal, the expressway identified during Atal Bihari Vajpayee regime will involve widening as well as construction of a new alignment stretch to cut down the travel time between Delhi and Meerut to an hour.
Sources said that the stretch between Nizamuddin Bridge and Dasna in Ghaziabad (NH-24) will be made 14 lanes. The six lanes at centre will be the dedicated corridor and commuters using these lanes will have to pay toll. Since the road connects Delhi with its suburb and to avoid a situation like that of Delhi-Gurgaon expressway where commuters opposed compulsory tolling, the rest eight lanes on both sides can be used by commuters without paying any user fee.
There will be a new alignment taking off from NH-24 at Dasna and will terminate at Meerut bypass. This stretch will be of six lanes and will be completely access controlled.
The other projects include four-laning projects -- a bridge in Varanasi, Sulatnpur-Varanasi highway, Ambala-Kaitha highway in Haryana and Yadgiri-Warangal highway section in Andhra Pradesh.
All these projects could not be taken to the Cabinet by UPA government as the poll process had started.
Dipak.Dash@timesgroup.com