Punjab Chief Minister Capt Amarinder Singh on Tuesday met Union Minister for Road Transport, Highways and Shipping Nitin Gadkari to seek expeditious implementation of Delhi-Amritsar-Katra Expressway project, besides approval for four important roads in border area and other important roads of the State.Seeking the intervention of the Union Minister to speed up implementation of Delhi-Amritsar-Katra Expressway project, the Chief Minister brought to his notice that alignment of the Expressway was finalised in consultation with State of Punjab and Haryana. He said the new alignment option proposed to be adopted would start from Amritsar and go straight up to Delhi Western Peripheral Expressway or Kundli-Manesar–Palwal Expressway in Delhi, with spurs connecting important religious and economic centres such as Dera Baba Nanak, Qadian, Attari Border, Gandiwind, Tarn Taran, Goindwal Sahib, Makhu, Kapurthala, Jalandhar, Ludhiana, Shri Muktsar Sahib, Malerkotla, Talwandi Sabo, Patiala, Moonak etc.
The Chief Minister emphasized that the construction of this Expressway linking the National Capital with the two border states of Punjab and J&K was of extreme importance and the Ministry should ask the consultant to submit final draft of Detailed Project Report based on final alignment at the earliest.
Seeking the upgradation, strengthening and development of missing links in Sri Hargobindpur-Batala-Fatehgarh Churian-Ajnala-Chogawan-Atari road in the border area of Punjab, the Chief Minister said that this 97.18 km road stretch was very important for defence forces as it provides alternate routes for movement of army in the area.
The Chief Minister requested that keeping in view the increased traffic intensity on this road there was an urgent need to upgrade this entire road length and sought approval of this project at the earliest. The Chief Minister also sought the nod for Rs. 425.62 crore project submitted by the state for upgradation of 557 km road lengths of border districts of Ferozepur, Fazilka, Tarn Taran, Gurdaspur and Pathankot.He also sought announcement of interstate roads Banga-Garhshankar-Anandpur Sahib-Naina Devi road and Fatehabad-Ratia-Budladha and Mandi on NH148 B as National Highways during the current financial year as DPR for them had already been submitted.The Chief Minister also thanked the Union Minister for successful completion of the project of upgradation of Bathinda-Zirakpur National Highway. He also brought to the notice of the Union Minister that the Amritsar-Bathinda National Highway was also complete, barring one flyover at Makhu on which work was being expedited and informed him that land acquisition for Ropar-Phagwara National Highway had also been speeded up.Seeking early in-principle nod for proposal for developing Ring Road for Chandigarh passing through Punjab, Haryana and Himachal Pradesh submitted by UT on priority basis, the Chief Minister said that early approval was required to finalise interstate alignments of the roads of three states and UT.Promising to personally look into these projects, the Union Minister Nitin Gadkari issued instructions to the concerned officials of the Ministry and NHAI to monitor the progress of these projects on regular basis.