The National Highways Development Project (NHDP) was a project of four laning of existing national highways and six laning of selected major national highways of India. The project was started in 1998 under the leadership of

Prime Minister A prime minister or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. A prime minister is not the head of state, but r ...

Atal Bihari Vajpayee Atal Bihari Vajpayee (25 December 1924 – 16 August 2018) was an Indian poet, writer and statesman who served as the prime minister of India, first for a term of 13 days in 1996, then for a period of 13 months from 1998 ...

National Highways National Highways (NH), formerly Highways England and before that the Highways Agency, is a State-owned enterprise, government-owned company charged with operating, maintaining and improving Roads in England, motorways and major A roads in Eng ...

account for only about 2% of the total length of roads, but carry about 40% of the total traffic across the length and breadth of the country. This project is managed by the

National Highways Authority of India The National Highways Authority of India or NHAI () is an autonomous agency of the Government of India, set up in 1995 (Act 1988) and is responsible for management of a road network of over 50,000 km of National highways out of 1,32,499 ...

(NHAI) under the Ministry of Road, Transport and Highways. The NHDP represents 49,260 km of roads and highways work and construction in order to boost economic development of the country. The government has planned to end the NHDP program in early 2018 and subsume the ongoing projects under a larger Bharatmala project. India roadway map

Project phases

The project is composed of the following phases: * Phase I: The

Golden Quadrilateral The Golden Quadrilateral (; abbreviated GQ) is a network of National Highway (India), national highways connecting major cities of India. It roughly forms a quadrilateral with major cities – Delhi (north), Kolkata (east), Mumbai (west) and ...

(GQ; 5,846 km) connecting the four major cities of

Delhi Delhi, officially the National Capital Territory (NCT) of Delhi, is a city and a union territory of India containing New Delhi, the capital of India. Straddling the Yamuna river, but spread chiefly to the west, or beyond its Bank (geography ...

Mumbai Mumbai ( ; ), also known as Bombay ( ; its official name until 1995), is the capital city of the Indian state of Maharashtra. Mumbai is the financial capital and the most populous city proper of India with an estimated population of 12 ...

Chennai Chennai, also known as Madras (List of renamed places in India#Tamil Nadu, its official name until 1996), is the capital city, capital and List of cities in Tamil Nadu by population, largest city of Tamil Nadu, the southernmost states and ...

and

Kolkata Kolkata, also known as Calcutta ( its official name until 2001), is the capital and largest city of the Indian state of West Bengal. It lies on the eastern bank of the Hooghly River, west of the border with Bangladesh. It is the primary ...

. This project, connecting four metro cities, is . Total cost of the project is Rs.300 billion (US$6.8 billion), funded largely by the government’s special petroleum product tax revenues and government borrowing. In January 2012, India announced the four-lane GQ highway network as complete. * Phase II: North-South and East-West corridors comprising national highways connecting four extreme points of the country. The

North–South and East–West Corridor The North–South and East–West Corridor is a network of National Highway (India), national highways connecting major cities of India. It consists of two highway systems – the North–South highway extending from Srinagar in the north t ...

(NS-EW; 7,142 km) connecting

Srinagar Srinagar (; ) is a city in Indian-administered Jammu and Kashmir in the disputed Kashmir region.The application of the term "administered" to the various regions of Kashmir and a mention of the Kashmir dispute is supported by the tertiary ...

in the north to

Kanyakumari Kanyakumari (Tamil; / kəɳjɑkʊmɑɾiː/; referring to Devi Kanya Kumari, officially known as Kanniyakumari, formerly known as Cape Comorin) is a town and a municipality in Kanyakumari district in the state of Tamil Nadu, India. It is the ...

in the south, including spur from Salem to

(Via

Coimbatore Coimbatore (Tamil: kōyamputtūr, ), also known as Kovai (), is one of the major Metropolitan cities of India, metropolitan cities in the States and union territories of India, Indian state of Tamil Nadu. It is located on the banks of the Noyy ...

and

Kochi Kochi ( , ), List of renamed Indian cities and states#Kerala, formerly known as Cochin ( ), is a major port city along the Malabar Coast of India bordering the Laccadive Sea. It is part of the Ernakulam district, district of Ernakulam in the ...

) and

Silchar Silchar is a city and the headquarters of the Cachar district of the state of Assam, India. It is second largest city of Assam after Guwahati in terms of population and GDP. It is also administrative capital of Barak Valley division. It is locate ...

in the east to

Porbandar Porbandar is a city and the headquarters of Porbandar district in the Indian state of Gujarat. It is the birthplace of Mahatma Gandhi and Sudama. It was the former capital of the Porbandar State, Porbandar princely state. Porbandar and Chhaya, ...

in the west. Total length of the network is . As of 31 October 2016, 90.99% of the project had been completed, 5.47% of the project work is under Implementation and 3.52% of the total length is left. It also includes Port connectivity and other projects — . The final completion date to 28 February 2009 at a cost of Rs.350 billion (US$8 billion), with funding similar to Phase I. * Phase III: The government on 12 April 2007 approved NHDP-III to upgrade of national highways on a Build, Operate and Transfer (BOT) basis, which takes into account high-density traffic, connectivity of state capitals via NHDP Phase I and II, and connectivity to centres of economic importance. * Phase IV: The government on 18 June 2008 approved widening of highway that were not part of Phase I, II, or III. Phase IV will convert existing single-lane highways into two lanes with paved shoulders. * Phase V: As road traffic increases over time, a number of four-lane highways will need to be upgraded/expanded to six lanes. On 5 October 2006 the government approved for upgrade of about of four-lane roads. * Phase VI: The government is working on constructing expressways that would connect major commercial and industrial townships. It has already identified of Vadodara (earlier Baroda)-Mumbai section that would connect to the existing Vadodara (earlier Baroda)-Ahmedabad section. The

World Bank The World Bank is an international financial institution that provides loans and Grant (money), grants to the governments of Least developed countries, low- and Developing country, middle-income countries for the purposes of economic development ...

is studying this project. The project will be funded on BOT basis. The Expressway between

—

Bangalore Bengaluru, also known as Bangalore (List of renamed places in India#Karnataka, its official name until 1 November 2014), is the Capital city, capital and largest city of the southern States and union territories of India, Indian state of Kar ...

and Expressway between

—

Dhanbad Dhanbad is the second-most populated city in the Indian state of Jharkhand after Jamshedpur and a major financial hub of Jharkhand. In terms of economy, Dhanbad has the largest economy in the state of Jharkhand and it is often referred to as th ...

has been identified and feasibility study and DPR contract has been awarded by NHAI. * Phase VII: This phase calls for improvements to city road networks by adding ring roads to enable easier connectivity with national highways to important cities. In addition, improvements will be made to stretches of national highways that require additional flyovers and bypasses given population and housing growth along the highways and increasing traffic. The government has planned to invest Rs. 16,680 Cr for this phase. The long

Chennai Port Chennai Port, formerly known as Madras Port, is the second largest container port of India, behind Mumbai's Jawaharlal Nehru Port also known as Jawaharlal Nehru Port, Nhava Sheva. The port is the largest one in the Bay of Bengal. It is the thir ...

— Maduravoyal Elevated Expressway is being executed under this phase. Note: 1 crore= 10 million

Status from NHAI website

National Highways Development Project is being implemented in all phases. The present phases are improving more than 49,260 km of arterial routes of NH network to international standards. The project-wise details of NHDP all phases is below as of 18 May 2021:

Subsummation in Bharatmala project

National Highway Development Project will close by first half of 2018, with the launch of Bharatmala project. 10,000 km of highway construction left under NHDP will be merged with Phase I of the Bharatmala.

References

External links

"Rs. 3.2 trillion for infrastructure in 11th plan"
- India e-News article, dated 6 July 2006.
NHAI Project Photographs

India Highways Group with many pictures

— extremely detailed

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''NYT'') is an American daily newspaper based in New York City. ''The New York Times'' covers domestic, national, and international news, and publishes opinion pieces, investigative reports, and reviews. As one of ...

article, dated 4 December 2005 (''free registration required'') *
NHAI list Rs.30bn masala bond on Singapore Exchange (SGX) to boost infrastructure development fund
{{Transport in India Roads in India Deveolpment Project-NHDP Proposed road infrastructure in India Ministry of Road Transport and Highways

Project phases

Status from NHAI website

Subsummation in Bharatmala project

See also

References

External links