Ready to give Rs 50k crore to Tamil Nadu if assured land: Nitin Gadkari

Chennai: Lamenting that road infrastructure have hit a roadblock in TN and rest of the country as well, Union roadways, highways and shipping minister Nitin Gadkari assured to immediately provide Rs 50,000 crore to TN, provided the government ensured land for the projects.

“I am ready to provide Rs 50,000 crore for road infrastructure projects in TN where two projects have gone to the Supreme Court and remaining 10 are pending, if the state government gives land. And across the country about Rs 1.80 lakh crore projects have not seen the light of the day,” the minister said on Monday night while addressing the members of the Madras Chamber of Commerce and Industry (MCCI) here.

Asserting that government is not supposed to run business but administer and frame policy, he said he was keen on expediting projects and make sure the GDP is enhanced by two per cent in two years. His ministry encountered the problems resulting out of difficulty in acquiring lands and encroachments in most of the cases. To overcome the hurdles, his ministry has created a land bank and even created the Project Management Consultancy to launch 500 projects this year.

“My target is to lay roads for '5 lakh crore in five years and all the NH in Tamil Nadu will be made four lanes. I promise you will have good infrastructure, provided the state government cooperates. Rarding Chennai Port Trust, I suggested the officials to establish a satellite port to decongest the container traffic,” Mr Gadkari said and assured to provide a major port at Colachel in Kanyakumari district. “We don’t want to play politics with development,” he added.

Earlier, expressing regrets over Lankan court awarding death sentence to five TN fishermen, he said the Centre would take up the issue with Sri Lanka. “It is unfortunate. We have taken it seriously,” Mr Gadkari on his maiden visit to state after becoming minister.