The pace of highway construction is expected to slow down this year, while the government is considering building world-class roads at a faster pace.
According to the latest construction report of the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways (MoRTH), only about 8,064 km of highways have been built against the target of 12,000 km in 11 months of the current financial year.
While this is slightly higher than the 8045 kms built in the previous fiscal, it will have to complete over 4,000 kms per day in March to reach the target of 12,000 kms. The highest that NHAI has achieved is 40 km per day.
With the pace of construction so far this year, the National Highways Authority of India may not even reach the 10,000-km mark, which is far down from last year, when prolonged rains and the third Covid wave cut construction to 10,400 km Was, said an official privy to the development.
The government’s road construction data shows that till the end of February, 8,064 km of highways have become operational in the country, including 1,200 km in February and just 1,000 km in January. The government is hoping that with the pressure on completing projects closer to commissioning, NHAI can still get closer to the targeted highway construction as it did last year.
Queries sent to NHAI and the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways remained unanswered till the time of writing. But officials said the slow pace can be attributed to NHAI using a part of the government’s budgetary allocation to reduce its debt. 3 trillion.
Construction in FY23 is also slower than the year before the pandemic, resulting in wide-scale disruption of economic activity. While there is a slowdown in construction, road awards are witnessing a pick-up in FY23, indicating that construction will also pick up in the coming months. NHAI has allocated a total of 7,497 km of highways till February this year, as against only 7,618 km in the same period last year.
The pace in road awards is a sign of improvement in the health of the sector with increasing appetite of contractors to take up projects.
While the government did not give any reason for the poor performance in highway construction this year, a road transport ministry official said disruptions from the Omicron wave and prolonged monsoon prevented NHAI from completing the targeted 12,000 km last year, and Looks like the trend continues this year.
The above-quoted official said that with the huge amount of funds with the government to complete the roads at a quick pace, visible changes could be seen next year with a record high construction. A MoRTH official said the current development is in line with the three-year trend where construction has been slow in the first six months but picked up pace thereafter.
“This year also we have exceeded the target till February, which means the shortfall may be removed soon,” the official said.
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