Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications
Friday, May 12, 2006
Financial Daily from THE HINDU group of publications Friday, May 12, 2006 |
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Roadways Industry & Economy - Infrastructure Centre plans to implement $ 50-b highway projects Our Bureau
The Centre is currently considering phases IV to VII of the National Highway Development Programme
A FILE picture of national highways
Hyderabad , May 11 The Union Government is intending to take up highway projects costing about Rs 2,20,000 crore ($50-billion) with a major portion of the projects proposed to be implemented through public private partnership (PPP) model, the National Highway Authority of India (NHAI) Member (Technical), Mr Nirmal Jit Singh, has said. Addressing a national seminar on `Road Construction Projects' organised by the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) here on Thursday, he said the huge programme requires, apart from substantial private sector financing, a massive expansion in contracting and consultancy sector, human resources in terms of skilled manpower, equipment and improvements in dispute resolution mechanism.
Highway projects
Having already approved projects in three phases of National Highway Development Programme (NHDP), the Centre is currently considering phases IV to VII. Phase-IV would comprise two-laning with shoulders of 20,000 km of national highways. Phase-V would comprise six-laning of 6,500 km of NHs, primarily the Golden Quadrilateral and some other high-density corridors. Phase-VI comprises constructing 1,000 km of Expressways. The potential corridors include Vadodara-Mumbai, Delhi-Agra, Delhi-Jaipur, Delhi-Chandigarh, Chennai-Bangalore and Dhambad-Kolkata. Under Phase-VII, the Government plans to take up projects such as ring roads, bypasses and elevated highways, he said.
Road sector `attractive'
According to the Chairman of CII's Mining & Construction Equipment Division, Mr V.R.S. Natarajan, the Confederation is of the view that development of road projects in the country would tremendously benefit the manufacturing industry and would lead to overall GDP growth. As the investment in the road sector is coming up in a big way, CII views that there are a lot of opportunities for the earthmoving and construction equipment industry to meet the growing demand in this sector.
Plea to Government
In this context, CII has made certain submissions to the Union Ministry of Road Transport & Highways on behalf of the domestic equipment industry. According to Mr Natarajan, the domestic equipment industry is facing acute crises due to import of second hand machinery. Since there is no restriction on the age of the imported second hand machinery, it leads to grave hardship to the domestic industry. CII has urged the Government to impose higher import duty on the second hand machinery and also restrict the age of the equipment to seven years. The Confederation has also asked the Government to reduce the duty on parts and components of equipment compared to the new machinery. At present, the import duty on the machinery and equipment is 12.5 per cent. Further, CII has also urged the Government to withdraw the Purchase Preference Scheme. According to it, the present scheme of purchase is working against the policy of promoting efficiency and maximising domestic value-addition.
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