NEW DELHI: Construction of national highways (NH) touched around 12,300 km in 2023-24, almost 34 km per day. This is the second highest rate of NH construction in the country’s history. The highest so far has been 13,327 km in 2020-21 when construction touched 36.5 km per day.
TOI has also learnt that the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI), which builds and maintains wider highways, recorded the maximum ever construction of NHs at 6,644 km against the target of 6,544 km.“This is an increase of around 20% compared to 5,544 km NHs built by NHAI in FY 2022-23,” said an official.
Sources said that the capital expenditure by NHAI in 2023-24 also reached an all-time high of little over Rs 2 crore, around 20% more compared to FY 22-23. The current trend of expenditure for highway development is likely to continue for the next one decade before it reaches saturation.
Meanwhile, the transport ministry has proposed to the PMO for setting up of a dedicated Corridor Management Unit (CMU) in the NHAI to focus on operation and maintenance of highway stretches considering a two-fold increase in the length of widened NH in the past 10 years. As per projection, this will touch 89,900 km by 2037 and 1.27 lakh km by 2047. This will require having trained manpower to manage the highway stretches efficiently.