NEW DELHI: Union Minister of State for Road Transport and Highways (MoRTH) and Corporate Affairs (MCA) Harsh Malhotra said on Thursday that the Centre is moving ahead with an ambitious plan to ease traffic congestion in Delhi and the NCR.
The mix of ongoing, upcoming, and completed highway projects is aimed at transforming connectivity in and around the Capital. According to the minister, six decongestion projects, spanning 128 km and valued at Rs 23,850 crore, are in the planning stage, while another 91 km of works worth Rs 7,084 crore are currently under active implementation.
Speaking at Delhi Dialogues programme organised by this newspaper, Malhotra noted that the ministry has already delivered infrastructure projects worth Rs 80,545 crore, covering 1,679 km, marking a significant step toward reshaping the region’s road network.
“The ministry has been consistently working to make the national capital and its adjoining areas congestion-free. A proper plan has been chalked out, and it is being executed accordingly.
Lots of projects have been executed over a decade, and many more are in the pipeline. In the near future, the entire region will have an augmented network of road infrastructure, which will help to remove traffic deadlocks,” he said.
The minister said the extension of the Delhi–Amritsar–Katra Expressway from the KMP Expressway to UER-II—a 20 km stretch—will cost Rs 4,000 crore. The extension of UER-II from near Alipur to the Delhi–Dehradun Expressway near Tronica City—17 km long—will be built at a cost of Rs 3,350 crore, and the Eastern Extension of UER-II from the Delhi–Dehradun Expressway to Noida–Ghaziabad/Faridabad—65 km long—will come up at a cost of Rs 7,500 crore.
He added that a 5 km road tunnel from the Dwarka Expressway (near Shiv Murti, Mahipalpur) to Nelson Mandela Marg, Vasant Kunj, will be built at a cost of Rs 3,500 crore. An elevated corridor from AIIMS to the Mahipalpur Bypass, with further extension to the Gurgaon–Faridabad Road—20 km long—will be constructed for Rs 5,000 crore, and a half-kilometre-long interchange at Kalindi Kunj Intersection of the Delhi–Noida Road and Agra Canal Road near Okhla Barrage will be built for Rs 500 crore.
Additionally, three projects spanning 35 km and worth Rs 114 crore have been taken back from the Delhi government and will now be maintained by the National Highways Authority of India, which, the minister said, will help ease congestion through proper upkeep and maintenance.