Golden Quadrilateral meets midway death.

bommasaniv

Biggest failure of UPA govt?

The Ministry of Shipping, Road Transport and Highways has decided to give up on the much-delayed Golden Quadrilateral (GQ), the ambitious project of connecting all four metros with four-lane highways. Four years after its original deadline of December 2003, the Government has decided to complete as much of it as possible till June and then terminate all pending contracts.

As per the latest statistics of the Ministry, 196 km of the 5,946 km GQ is still incomplete. According to sources, the Ministry has now decided to terminate all the contracts if they spill over beyond June this year. Sources said that the unfinished stretches would then be taken up as part of National Highway Development Programme (NHDP) Phase V.

This phase would involve six-laning of GQ and is likely to be completed by December 2012. A senior NHAI official said, "Since it has been decided to six-lane the entire length of GQ, it would not make too much of difference to leave the incomplete stretches. They would be taken up for six-laning in one go."

According to the Ministry's own estimates, only 40 km of the incomplete length of 196 km would be completed by June. The remaining would spill over and the contracts would be terminated. The National Highways Authority of India (NHAI), the prime implementing agency for highway development, is also mulling over the possibility of action against errant contractors. High-level sources said that the decision has already been conveyed to the Committee on Infrastructure and the Parliamentary Standing Committee on transport, tourism and culture.

The NHAI has divided 196 km into 25 contracts. Of this 10, spread over 156 km, are likely to overshoot the revised deadline of June 2008. The stretches that will be given up and contracts terminated include 77-km Harihar-Chitradurga in Karnataka, 56-km Haveri-Harihar in Karnataka and 62.64-km Balasore-Bhadrak stretch in Orissa. Similarly, Orissa's 55.173-km-long Sunakhala-Ganjam stretch is not even 50 per cent complete. Though the original deadline for completion was April 2004, the present pace of work indicates that the project will only been completed by December 2009 -- over five years after the target.

The original deadline of completion for GQ was December 2003, which was revised to December 2004 and then to December 2005. Last year, the Ministry had expected to wrap up all work on GQ by end of 2007 or maximum by June 2008. However, now it seems the curtains will fall on the GQ.

ved · Telugu Veera Joined: 26 Feb 2006 Posts: 2003

It is only difference in semantics. In reality this is merged with NHAI. It is more of bureaucratic process. But it is true UPA govt failed to take infrastructure seriously. Even in Power generation nothing substantial happened (For AP Krishna Patnam 400mw power plant may be an exception ).