2018: A Year Of New Highs For India’s Infra

Building a robust infrastructure has been this government’s priority. As soon as it took charge in 2014, it got busy making plans to build projects that would change the face of the city. That momentum picked pace in 2018, considering India goes to polls in the New Year. While several revolutionary plans remained on the drawing board, some of them were able to see the light of the day. Let us try to see how far India travelled infrastructure-wise in the year gone by.  

Establishing a connection

Year 2018 has been a landmark year as far as building connectivity between cities goes. Throughout the year, a great many projects were launched that would provide India with a better connectivity web.

Metro: With the expansion of current routes and addition of new ones in smaller cities, India is in process to add another 500 kilometre (km) Metro lines to its existing 515-km network. If all goes according to plans, small cities such as Bhopal, Indore, Kanpur, Agra and Meerut will get a Metro connectivity by 2024-25.

In the national capital, various sections of the Delhi Metro’s Pink, Magenta, Violet and Aqua lines were thrown open during the year while the Delhi Metro Phase-IV got an approval in December. In financial capital Mumbai, on the other hand, Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated Line 5 & 9 recently and approved three new routes that would reach out to different corners of the suburban city. The Hyderabad Metro, too, would be expanded till the western quadrant while the work on Phase-II has started.

Air: Modi’s aspirational project to boost air connectivity between Tier-II and Tier-III cities, Ude Desh Ka Aam Nagrik (UDAN), was launched in 2016. However, it was this year that several new airport projects were inaugurated in various parts of the country. These include the Pakyong Airport (Sikkim), the Jharsuguda Airport (Odisha) and the Kannur Airport (Kerala).

Although the government had given an in-principal approval to 15 new airports in 2014, so far only seven airports have been completed and have become operational. Next few years will be instrumental in shaping India’s air transport infrastructure as several existing airports will be upgraded and operations will commence on new routes that would boost economic conditions of Tier-II and Tier-III cities.

 Roads: India, which has the second-largest road network in the world, saw the government awarding contracts for new projects at breakneck pace in 2018. While the Road Transport and Highways Ministry has fixed a target for construction of 10,000 km national highways in FY19, PM Modi intends to inaugurate at least 50 highway projects before the Lok Sabha elections.

About 200 road projects are close to completion now. Most of these are located in Maharashtra, Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan and Gujarat.

Among the road projects that were inaugurated during the year are the western and eastern peripheral expressways, the Delhi-Meerut Expressway, the Bogibeel Bridge, the Varanasi Ring Road and the Hindon Elevated Road, etc.

State governments also managed to complete some key road projects that were delayed in the past. These include the Signature Bridge in Delhi, the Coastal Road and the Nhava Shewa Link Road in Mumbai, the Peripheral Ring Road in Bengaluru and the Chennai-Bengaluru Expressway. Another major elevated corridor of the national capital, the Rani Jhansi Flyover, was also inaugurated this year.

This year, the government also allowed 100 per cent foreign direct investment in the road sector under the Bharatmala Pariyojana, providing a major boost to the sector.

A tale of many cities

While they were launched with a great deal of vigor in 2015, the Smart City Mission and the Atal Mission for Rejuvenation and Urban Transformation (AMRUT) did not make much news during 2018. While the final list of 100 cities that would be turned smart was finalised in June this year, there has been a negligible progress as far as the ground work goes. Many cities are still working on detailed project reports and inviting tenders. As of March, of the identified projects, 1,908 projects (over 69 per cent) were still preparing their detailed project report.

On the other hand, only 0.38 per cent funds have been used so far under the Amrut mission. Similarly, an amount of Rs 600 crore was earmarked to incentivise the states for implementing reforms during 2018-19. Of this, only which Rs 119 crore has been awarded as incentive to five cities for issuing the municipal bonds.

Apart from this, 20 major projects amounting to Rs 140 crore were completed under the National Heritage City Development and Augmentation Yojana (HRIDAY). The project is being implemented in 12 cities, including Ajmer, Amaravati, Amritsar, Badami, Dwaraka, Gaya, Kancheepuram, Mathura, Puri, Varanasi, Velankanni and Warangal.

Back to basics

Amid rising pollution levels, the noise around solid-waste management and river rejuvenation got louder during the year. Consequently, the Centre and states took steps to make corrections this year.

According to government data, in the water supply sector, around 154 projects worth Rs 1,325 crore were completed while tenders were issued for 151 projects worth Rs 8,047 crore. DPRs for 97 projects worth Rs. 4,318 crore were approved during 2018.

In the sewerage and seepage management sector, contracts for 491 projects worth Rs 21,508 crore were awarded. Of these, 40 projects worth Rs 520 crore were completed.

In the drainage sector, contracts for 516 projects worth Rs. 2,101 crore were awarded. Of these, 51 projects worth Rs 81 crore were completed.

In 2018, a total of 11 projects have been taken up under the Namami Gange Programme by the National Mission for Clean Ganga (NMCG) to conserve the River Yamuna in Delhi. Most of the projects are at various stages of implementation.

Going online

In order to bring in transparency and improve efficiency, states brought public services online this year. Apart from providing building-plan approvals, states are also bringing citizen specific services online. While hiccups were unavoidable due to technological barriers, the progress has been impressive. So much so that the country improved its ranking to 52^nd in giving construction permits in the World Bank’s Ease of Doing Business report this year. Its previous ranking was 181.

Real estate regulatory authorities of various states also came up with their own online portal where homebuyers could track registered projects, brokers and developers. 

Further, the Online Building Permission System (OBPS) has been implemented in 1,453 cities across the country. In Andhra Pradesh, Delhi, Gujarat, Himachal Pradesh, Jharkhand, Madhya Pradesh, Maharashtra, Punjab, Telangana and Tripura, the system has been implemented in all urban-local bodies.