It's not extortionists alone. Even trees and temples are acting as major stumbling blocks for timely completion of the country's largest infrastructure programme -- the ongoing Rs 58,000 crore (Rs 580 billion) National Highways Development Project.
Work on the Delhi-Kolkata stretch, for example, could spill over well beyond the December 2003 deadline as the Uttar Pradesh government has raised the environment bogey and is threatening legal action against the National Highways Authority of India for felling of trees. The NHAI's promise of large-scale replantation has predictably fallen on deaf ears.
B C Khanduri, minister of state for road transport and highways, says it's inconceivable that a project of this size can be implemented by keeping all the trees intact. However, nobody seems to be listening to the NHAI's commitment on adequate replantation.
The country's strong religious fervour is also putting paid to any hopes that the NHAI may have had for timely completion of a few sections on the Mumbai-Chennai corridor (NH-4) passing through Tamil Nadu.
The state is known for its huge number of temples and quite a few of these have to be shifted if the road project has to go on. But this is proving to be a highly sensitive and time-consuming issue, delaying the project inordinately.
NHAI officials are terming it a people's project so that a consensus evolves among the local people on the need to shift the temples.
"We have aligned roads such that a minimum number of temples and structures are displaced. Wherever temples are to be removed, we are facilitating building of structures on new sites," Khanduri said.
As if these headaches are not enough, the NHAI also has to grapple with extortionists, especially in states like Bihar. The first phase of the massive upgradation and multilaning project, the 5,846 km Golden Quadrilateral sections, was slated for "substantial completion" by December this year.
"I am worried about the completion of certain portions of the project, mainly on the World Bank funded NH-2 linking Delhi to Kolkata, within schedule. Of the 101 projects constituting the Golden Quadrilateral portion of the NHDP, 5-8 projects could spill over beyond the December 2003 deadline, largely due to these external factors," Khanduri told Business Standard.
According to Khanduri, who has regular debriefing sessions with the contractors, "all kinds of outfits are demanding money from the contractors". The ministry has already written to the Bihar government to provide law and order cover to the contractors. In West Bengal, for instance, NHAI officials get police protection for tackling land encroachment cases.
Apart from these sections on NH-2, the problem relating to the Allahabad Bypass, which was delayed because the alignment of the sections could not be finalised, was also likely to be sorted out soon, he said.
Work on the 1,419-km Delhi-Mumbai sections (NH 8) is proceeding the smoothest. Excepting "minor incidents" of land acquisition and encroachments in Orissa, work on the 1,684 km Kolkata-Chennai section (NH-5, 6 & 60) is also proceeding fine.
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