Aurangabad, June 15:
Union Minister for Road Transport and Highways Nitin Gadkari instructed the officers of the National Highway Authority of India (NHAI) to complete the Aurangabad-Paithan four-lane 30 meters wide national highway work without land new acquisition or reducing land acquisition costs. According to sources, the minister held a meeting with NHAI officers in Delhi on Tuesday and gave them the instructions.
Some officers from the project director’s office were making efforts to make it a two-lane road because of disputes in land acquisition and also possible Aurangabad-Pune highway.
The officers pursued the matter of two-lane with Nitin Gadkari. However, union Minister of the State for Finance Dr Bhagwat Karad, and union Minister of State for Railways Raosaheb Danve insisted on the demand for Aurangabad-Paithan four-lane road.
Significantly, Gadkari performed Bhoomipujan of Rs 1600 crore four-land road project on April 24. It was 30 meters wide road. When the project was handed over to the NHAI, a decision to increase the width of the road up to 45 meters was taken. This needed new land acquisition.
Within one month, the correspondence about changing from four lanes to two lanes was done between the NHAI offices of Aurangabad and Nagpur. The NHAI changed the report of vehicle traffic and cited reasons like bypass at Gevrai tanda and land acquisition dispute to make it a two-lane road.
The officers also hid information from the minister that four-lane can be developed on the available land. The minister instructed the officers to develop a four-lane road without new land acquisition or by reducing land acquisition costs. NHAI project director’s office will receive the minister’s instructions in the next one or two days.
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The minister asked the officers to acquire land as per the need. In the earlier plan, a bypass was proposed for three villages-Gevrai, Bidkin and Dhorkin. Now, the bypass stands to cancel.