Business: The Ministry of Road Transport and Highways is going to build many tunnels in the country in the coming years. To make people's travel by road easier, Union Minister Nitin Gadkari's ministry has focused on infrastructure. Under this, Gadkari's ministry has prepared a plan to spend Rs 1 lakh crore on building tunnels in the country.

Gadkari said-so many new tunnels will be built

Road Transport and Highways Minister Nitin Gadkari himself gave information about this plan of his ministry. He was participating in the second edition of Tunneling India Conference organized by industry organization FICCI on Tuesday. He said that there is a plan to build 74 new tunnels in the country at a cost of Rs 1 lakh crore, whose total length will be 273 kilometers.

Geographical diversity brings new challenges

Gadkari said that India's geography is full of diversity, which poses unique challenges in completing infrastructure projects. He said - To solve the unique challenges, we need to find out which technology is really best for us and can reduce the cost without compromising on quality.

Construction work of 69 tunnels is currently underway

The Union Minister said that the government has already completed the work of 35 tunnels in the country, whose combined length is 49 kilometers. The government has spent Rs 15 thousand crores in building those tunnels. Apart from that, the construction work of 69 additional tunnels is going on at a cost of about Rs 40 thousand crores, whose total length is 135 kilometers.

The quality of DPR is very poor in India

He also stressed the need to focus on the quality of construction. Gadkari said that the quality of DPR in India is very poor. DPR consultants are not following proper procedures in the construction of highways, roads or tunnels. Performance audit is more important than financial audit for projects. There is a need to adopt terrain-specific approach in India, especially in the Himalayan regions. In view of challenges like landslides in those areas, there is a need to adopt precast technology and push-back techniques etc.