THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Isn’t the state government being bold saying it will complete the Hill Highway by 2019 and Coastal Highway 2020 at a time when National Highway land acquisition is notoriously slow paced? Four-lane NH is 660 km, HH 1,023 km and CH 660 km. Ever since the LDF Government came to power last year, there has been significant progress in the NH development. Reason being that Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan himself calls the review meeting religiously every few weeks to monitor the progress being made by public works and revenue departments when it comes to the land acquisition. But despite the Union road transport and highways minister Nitin Gadkari offering better compensation package for landowners, they are still reluctant to part with their land. G. Kamala Vardhana Rao, the principal secretary of PWD, said the government had taken the NH development seriously and there would not be any laxity on the side of the officials.
“The government has already appointed a nodal officer, K. Biju, to speed up the alignment process which has been delayed. We are keen on completing the NH development works on time,” he told DC. The nodal officer said as such there are no challenges before him, but it was the alignment issues that the NH officials were being bogged down. However, he expressed hope that things would be on track within the next few months. “Alignments have been pending in Malappuram, Kozhikode, Thrissur and Ernakulam for the last several years. Within the next few days itself, the outstanding matters on NH 17 and NH 47 would be settled which would see 3 A notifications (power to acquire land),” Mr Biju, who is also the labour commissioner, told DC.
Hundreds of land acquisition units under the revenue department dysfunctional for the last three years have been revived. Currently, these officials have been entrusted with the delinking work where National Highway Authority of India officials have also increased their momentum in completing the allied works on time. The chief minister has been relentlessly keeping track on its progress. The alignment for the Ernakulam stretch will be published on Aug 23. However, the Malappuram stretch is still pending before the NH officials as it has to be cleared by the state government.
Parallelly, the chief minister has been holding regular review meetings on HH and CH in the presence of the PWD and fisheries ministers, G. Sudhakaran and J. Mercy Kutty Amma respectively. At the recent one, high-level officials of NH, Roads and Bridges Corporation and Kerala Road Fund Board informed that the HH and CH would be completed by 2020 and 2021 respectively. But the CM asked them to advance these two projects by a year leaving the officials in a fix. Already the PWD officials are angry at Mr Sudhakaran shooting off a letter asking them to work on public holidays as well. Putting this into practice, the Engineers Congress will be held on Vijayadasami day, Saturday.
A top department official said they were finding it difficult to cope with the demands of the work entrusted to them with less workforce. Kerala Infrastructure Investment Fund Board (KIIFB) is expected to give clearance for projects costing Rs 30,000 crore this year. “Currently, there are only 1,300 engineers in the department when the actual strength should have been 2,000. So with less workforce and resources on one side and massive investments being envisaged, it will definitely be difficult to meet the expectations of the government,” he told DC. The 1251-km HH stretches from Nandarapadavu in Kasaragod to Parassala in Thiruvananthapuram with an outlay of Rs 3,500 crore to be funded by the KIIFB. It will pass through all districts except Alappuzha.
The government hopes to complete 25 reaches in 13 districts this year. The PWD has three special purpose vehicles to mobilise resources outside budget provisions – Kerala Road Fund Board (KRFB), Road Infrastructure Company Kerala Ltd (RICK) and Roads and Bridges Development Corporation of Kerala (RBDCK). “Unlike HH, the CH development is going to be tricky as population density is higher, and people are highly sensitive,” said a top PWD official. The 623-km CH between Manjeshwaram in Kasaragod and Poovar in Thiruvananthapuram aims at decongesting the NH and connecting a string of harbours in nine districts including Kollam, Alappuzha, Ernakulam, Thrissur, Malappuram, Kozhikode and Kannur and Kasaragod. The government also aims at tapping the tourism potential as well. A KRFB official said they would acquire land from the coastal area through the right of way. Chief secretary K. M. Abraham has been directly reviewing the progress of the two where he has already asked the concerned officials not to go for large-scale development and alleviate the fears of the coastal communities.
