BHUBANESWAR: The State Government has achieved a major milestone by constructing 7009.19 km rural roads, the highest among all the states in the country, by the end of this financial year.In 2016-17, the State was adjudged the second best performer in the country after Bihar and received an incentive of Rs 175.67 crore from the Ministry of Rural Development (MoRD) for constructing 5796.93 km roads. Bihar had topped the list by constructing 6601.62 km of road.
“The State was given a target for construction of 7,000 km of roads in 2017-18, which is the highest in the country for any state. We completed 7009 km of rural road and this is the highest ever yearly achievement of the State since inception of Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana (PMGSY) in 2000,” said Rural Development Secretary Bishnupada Sethi.
After Odisha, the other better performing states for the current fiscal are Bihar (4955.10 km), Madhya Pradesh (4672.32 km) and Jharkhand (3752 km).
Secretary in the Ministry of Rural Development Amarjeet Sinha hailed the State Government for achieving the unique feat, Sethy said.
Among the districts, Sethi said Sundargarh constructed highest length of 710.033 km of roads followed by Mayurbhanj (633.77 km), Ganjam (547 km), Koraput (513.30 km) and Malkangiri (429.664 km). Further, the State has bettered its performance in construction of roads by using new technologies like cement stabilisation, cold mix, gravel with slag, iron slag for sub grade improvement, roller compacted concrete pavement, terrazyme and waste plastics for constructing 768.517 km of roads, he added.
On the cumulative achievement of the State under the flagship rural infrastructure programme, Sethi said 46,820 km of road has been constructed at an expenditure of Rs 19174.48 crore by March 31.
The Ministry has so far sanctioned projects worth Rs 23,974.16 crore for construction of 60,594.42 km of rural roads.