Status of infrastructure development of

India

“…IT IS NOT WEALTH THAT BUILT THE ROADS BUT, ROADS THAT BUILT OUR

WEALTH”-John F. Kennedy

India’s rise in recent years is a most prominent development in the world economy.

India has re-emerged as one of the fastest growing economies in the world.

India’s growth, particularly in manufacturing and services, has boosted the sentiments, both within country and abroad.

According to many commentators, India could unleash its full potentials, provided it improves the infrastructure facilities, which are at present not sufficient to meet the growing demand of the economy.

Introduction

Failing to improve the country’s infrastructure will slow down India’s growth process. Therefore, Indian government’s first priority is rising to the challenge of maintaining and managing high growth through investment in infrastructure sector, among others.

India, while stepping up public investment in infrastructure, has been actively engaged in involving private sector to meet the growing demand.

The most distinct part of India’s physical infrastructure development in recent years is the development of road network across the country; per sq. km. of surface area in India is now endowed with one km of roadways.

Roads Roads

India has one of the largest road networks in the world, aggregating to 3.34 million km. The country’s road network consists of Expressways, National Highways, State Highways, Major District Roads, Other District Roads and Village Roads.

The road network, as on December 2007, comprises 66,590km of National Highways, 128,000 km of State Highways, 470,000 km of Major District Roads and about 2.65 million km of other District and Rural Roads.

National Highways comprise only about 2% of the total length of roads and carry about 40% of the total traffic across the length and breadth of the country.

Out of the total length of National Highways, 32 percent is single lane/intermediate lane, 56 percent is 2-lane standard and the balance of 12 percent is 4-lane standard or more.

The National Highways Development Project (NHDP), the largest highway project ever undertaken by the country, is being implemented by the National Highway Authority of India (NHAI).

NHDP Phase I & II envisage 4/6 laning of about 14,279 km of National Highways, at a total estimated cost of Rs.650 million (at 2004 prices). These two phases comprise of Golden Quadrilateral (GQ), North-South and East-West Corridors, Port Connectivity and other projects.

The Golden Quadrilateral (GQ-5,846 km) connects the four major cities of Delhi, Mumbai, Chennai and Kolkata.

The North-South and East-West Corridors (NS-EW-7,300 km) connect Srinagar in the North to Kanyakumari in the South, including spur from Salem to Kochi and Silchar in the East to Porbandar in the West.

The Indian economy is booming, trade is increasing and the standard of living is going up. This has resulted in a higher emphasis on our nation’s infrastructure. This is particularly true for the roads in the country as they remain the most common mode of transport for the people.

Traffic on Indian roads has been steadily increasing by 7-10% per annum. This has led to about 25%-30% of national and state highways being heavily congested with truck speeds of around 25-40 km/hr.

Better Roads For a Development India

Reliance Infrastructure

Therefore, with an objective of achieving the world class road infrastructure in the country, the Government has successfully ensured the participation of private sector in road development. It is expected that the share of private investments shall go up from 5% in 10th plan to 36% in 11th plan.

At present, RInfra has eleven projects with a total length of 968 kms, costing around Rs.11700 crores. Out of them, NK Toll and DS Toll Road projects; both on National highways (NH) 7 are completed and are commercially in operation from Sep 09.

NHAI is coming out with 10 Mega Highway Projects and major 6 laning projects for an increased utilisation of India’s road potential. Taking advantage of this opportunity, RInfra is targeting to build road business up to Rs 20000 crores by end of this financial year. This showcases the initiatives that RInfra is adopting proactively to build roads that are an amalgamation of corridors to propel India’s growth and development.

Our Current Projects

NK Toll Road Limited has constructed 43 kms long 4 lane National Highway (NH 7) road connecting Namakkal and Karur in Tamil Nadu with a concession period of 20 years. This toll road is in operation from last week of Aug 2009 and is collecting average toll revenue of Rs. 4.45lakhs/day. The major challenge during the construction was to construct a major bridge of 800 meter across river Cauvery. This bridge construction included different types of foundations to precast pre-stressed concrete super structures.

Projects under Operation

DS Toll Road Limited has constructed 53 kms long 4 lane National Highway (NH 7) road connecting Dindigul and Samynallore near Madurai in Tamil Nadu with a concession period of 20 years. This toll road is in operation from last week of Sep 2009 and is collecting average revenue of Rs. 8.5 lakhs/day. The major challenge during the construction was to construct Railway Over Bridges over Railway line that runs close to the NH all along the corridor. This railway line crosses NH at 3 locations. Building Railway Over Bridges at these locations in coordination with the Railways was a major challenge.

TK Toll Road Private Limited is constructing 81 kms long 4 lane National Highway (NH67) road from Trichy to Karur in the state of Tamil Nadu with a concession period of 30 years. This is a challenging project to construct as the corridor runs between a river and railway line. Both traffic diversion and Construction activity to be carried out within the limited available land.

SU Toll Road Private Limited is constructing 136 kms long 4 lane National Highway (NH68) road from Salem to Ulenderpet in the state of Tamil Nadu with a concession period of 25 years. This was the first project of more than 100 km to be awarded by NAHI on BOT Toll basis.

Projects under Execution

TD Toll Road Private Limited is constructing 88 kms long 4 lane National Highway (NH45) road connecting Trichy and Dindigul in the state of Tamil Nadu with a concession period of 30 years.

GF Toll Road Limited is constructing 66km of State / MDR road in the state of Haryana. GF Toll has signed the concession agreement with Haryana PWD for a concession period of 17 years. Scope includes construction and tolling of 4 lane corridor between Gurgaon-Faridabad of 33.10 kms. This is one of the busiest corridors in the state of Haryana. The project also includes improvement/reconstruction and tolling of Ballabgarh-Sohna road of 33.98 kms.