The urban expert

RK Jha is the Director of Gujarat International Finance Tec-City Co (GIFT), a joint venture of Government of Gujarat and IL&FS, has over 44 years of professional experience in planning, design, project development, execution (including financing), research & development of large projects covering Town Planning, Transportation Planning, Detailed planning and design of Integrated Urban infrastructure as well and execution of the Projects. Jha is a Civil Engineer, has Master’s Degrees from India, Canada, UK and USA with specialisation in Transportation Engineering and Project Financing.

His assignments include Head of Transportation & Communication, CIDCO, and Executive Director of the Maharashtra State Road Development Corporation (MSRDC). He is also a Professor of Civil Engineering at IIT Bombay, Visiting Professor at a number of prestigious national institutions like IIM Bangalore, Delhi School of Planning & Architecture, New Delhi, Railway Staff College, Baroda, etc, President/Executive President of Navi Mumbai Special Economic Zone (NMSEZ) and Project Director of Transportation Infrastructure Business Group (TIBG) of NMSEZ/MSEZ.

Some of the important projects to his credit are planning and development of Navi Mumbai, Mass Rapid Transit of Navi Mumbai, Mumbai-Pune Expressway, planning of International Airports at Navi Mumbai, Multimodal International Hub Airport at Nagpur, Western Freeway Sea Link, Mumbai Trans-Harbour Link, Mass Rapid Transit Systems of Thane City, Nagpur City and Pune City, Planning of Goshree Island at Kochi and Planning of New Mahabaleshwar Hill Station, and planning of SEZ at Navi Mumbai. He has pioneered many large projects on BOT format, and has extensive experience in developing such projects from concept to implementation. He has been a member of many important expert committees of Government of India, Maharashtra Government and professional bodies. He is widely travelled and well respected in professional and concerned government circles.