Work on national highways on war-footing: Muniappa

Ahmednagar, Mar 27 (UNI) Union Minister of State for Surface Transport and Highways K H Muniappa today said the work on improving 50,000 km of the total of 66,500 km of national highways in the country has been taken up on a war-footing and would be completed by 2012.

Mr Muniappa was talking to mediapersons here after visiting the famed Sai Baba temple at Shirdi along with his family.

Mr Muniappa was welcomed by Sai Baba temple trustee Ashok Khambekar and executive officer Kishor Kadam who presented the minister with a statuette of Sai Baba upon his arrival at the temple.

Mr Muniappa said the work on improving the highways had been taken up at a cost of Rs 235,000 crore and, once the work was completed, it would lead to a 35 per cent increase in the country's revenue.

It would lead to a 30 per cent savings in petrol and diesel while the life of the vehicles too would be enhanced by at least ten years, he claimed.

The minister said work on the 7,300-km Srinagar-Kanyakumari and Salem-Porbander highways were progressing on a war-footing and would be completed by 2010.

The scope of the Golden Quadrangle Project too had been enhanced to 6,500 km, he said. The first phase of this project was in the last stages of completion, he added.

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