While the Smart Cities Mission has given a boost to infrastructure development, it is also important to build sustainable infrastructure that protects natural resources and the environment.

Total order backlog of the engineering and construction firms was Rs.8.1 trillion at the end of FY18. Of the whole order backlog, almost 62 per cent was contributed by the construction companies, followed by 24 per cent of capital goods companies catering to the energy industry.

Stakeholders harp on the government's infrastructure push and expect construction orders of Rs.18 trillion in the next six years. This order inflow volume should support 12 to 15 per cent of industry-level execution of compound annual growth rate (CAGR).

Two-thirds of the infrastructure investment, as per the revised plan, was to be funded by the public sector (central and state governments) while the remaining one-third was to come from the private sector.

Until recently, we used to talk about the cost of funds being too high and, as you are aware, some infrastructure projects have a long gestation period. There is a period of construction and then there are cost overruns and delays.

Policy actions to revive stalled projects, expedite approvals, introduce hybrid annuity and toll-operate-transfer (TOT) models in highways, and sustain rapid growth in renewable capacity augur well for the infrastructure financing landscape.

Sanjeev Kaushik, Deputy Managing Director, India Infrastructure Finance Company Ltd, speaks on the challenges facing infra financing and the likely contours of the post-GST regime

The major policy initiatives of MoRTH in recent past are as follows: Exit Policy: The cabinet recently allowed private developers to exit all operational BOT projects two years from start of operations.

A quality transition to the planned expansion will require a huge capital investment in electricity, railways, roads, ports, airports, irrigation, water supply and sanitation systems.