A report on the 5th India Roads Conference held last month in Delhi.
The National Highways Authority of India (NHAI), the National Rural Roads Development Agency (NRRDA) and the state road deveÂlopment corporations will be busy next year.A major part about 20,000 km of the National Highways Development Programme’s (NHDP) Phase IV will be bid out in 2012.On another front, the Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana (PMGSY), targeted at covering rural habitations with motorable roads, will see a large augmentation in budgetary allocation in the 12th Plan, and will be more aggressive.Many states have shown aggression in connecting their states’ cities, towns and villages better next year.
While more projects are likely to be offered next year onwards on an EPC model, experts forecast that many rural road projects may be awarded through PPP by bundling in packages:New pilot schemes including the “modified EPC basis†will be on the anvil.
Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh announced recently that “In the 12th Plan (2012-17), we will pay special attention to the remote areas of our country and to rural areas.Connecting such areas by rail and road will get the top-most priority.â€
How will our country achieve the objective that the Prime Minister has set at the threshold of the new Five Year Plan? With its underlying theme, “Connecting Rural with Urban India for Inclusive Growthâ€, the 5th India Roads Conference triggered policy as well as brass-tack questions on the linkages will be seamless and qualitatively superior. The two-day conference held at the Taj Mahal Hotel in New Delhi on 15-16 February was jointly chaired by JN Singh, Member (Finance), National Highways Authority of India (NHAI), and Arvind Mayaram, Additional Secretary and FA at the Union Ministry of Rural Development.
Expressway bid-out: In his address, Singh announced that the new expressways, the first of which is planned between Delhi and Meerut, will be bid out only after land acquisition is complete or at least nearing comÂpletion, as against the norm for National Highways (NHs) development, whereby construction starts after 80 per cent of the land acquired by invoking Right-of-Way (RoW). Expressways will be necessarily greenfield projects and land acquisition may not be as straightforward as in the mostly-brownfield NH expansion projects.
Quality concerns:Expectedly, as Public-Private Partnership (PPP) in infrastructure goes on-stream, debÂate as to its success has begun.Speakers significantly queÂstioned whether PPP had necessarily ensured qualiÂtative improvement in highways. Even though the expecÂtation from Build-Operate-Transfer (BOT) roads was of supeÂrior construction quality so as to support lower mainÂÂteÂnance costs (stemming from the Defect Liability Clause), this has not happened in reality. Indeed, the contractual Engineering, Procurement, Construction (EPC) projects have proved to be superior in quality as well as in maintaining timelines.A quality inspection speÂcialist warned that warranty systems based on assured quality of construction would soon find their way into India. Such systems are a norm in most western countries.
Application of research: New technology and proÂcesses such as enzyme-based surface technology (whose pilot project in Maharashtra enabled a 4 km greenfield stretch to be completed in 14 days), as well as existing ones such as fly ash and coir-based surface material were discussed, and led to a debate on why new technology, even though internationally accepted even exported has not been acceptable en masse on Indian roads.Speakers and delegates pointed out that while low-cost technology would be particularly useful while inviting private participation in the small-ticket rural road projects, the adoption and massification and approval levels of such technology was very low.
Rural roads bundling: The rural roads segment of the conference was a major draw more out of curiosity among private players, who later identified that segment as an eye opener of sorts because of the information it offered. Mayaram outlined the plan for PPP in rural roads, whereby small clusters of roads around a location would be bid out, amounting to Rs 50-100 crore.-Shashidhar Nanjundaiah
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