BHUBANESWAR: The 84th annual session of the Indian Roads Congress (IRC) kicked off on a grand note on Thursday with Works minister Prithiviraj Harichandan inaugurating the technical exhibition at Janata Maidan here.
This is for the sixth time after a decade that Odisha is hosting the IRC. The last session in the state had been held in 2015. Union minister for Road Transport and Highways, Nitin Gadkari will formally inaugurate the conference on Friday.
Addressing mediapersons, Harichandan said the conference will serve as a vital platform for knowledge exchange among experts and engineers in road infrastructure. The state government has planned to construct 75,000 km of roads over the next five years and the deliberations in the conference will help better the road engineering, he added.
The IRC-2025 themed ‘major advances in highway technology and policy’ brings together over 3,500 engineers, policymakers, researchers, academicians, industry stakeholders and public authorities from across the country to discuss advancements and policies in the roads and highways sector.
The four-day conference features 19 thematic sessions focusing on innovation, sustainable road construction, cost optimisation and advanced tunnelling techniques. Key meetings include the IRC council meetings, Indian roads research board meeting and several sessions involving state and central officials, international organisations and multilateral agencies.
A major attraction of the event is the open-to-sky exhibition, where 20 stalls are displaying live demonstrations of road-building technologies, including mechanised mastic asphalt, fly ash utilisation, porous concrete and nano-modified bitumen.
CM Mohan Charan Majhi, Union ministers Ajay Tamta and Harsh Malhotra and Madhya Pradesh Public Works minister Rakesh Singh will grace the formal inaugural ceremony.
The event also features traditional cuisine. Signature dishes like Dahi Bara Aloo Dum, Rasabali, Chhenapoda and Pakhala Kansa have been included in the menu at hotels and conference venues. IRC president Manoranjan Parida, principal secretary, Works Sanjay Kumar Singh and organising secretary Manas Ranjan Behera were present.