JAMMU: In yet another glaring and unaccountable loss of public exchequer, crores of rupees of taxpayers is lost due to lack of long-sighted policies of the government, as the construction work on the Kunjwani-Narwal section of Jammu-Katra Expressway is kept in limbo for three weeks now.
The fate of this section of the expressway, which was estimated to come up at the cost of Rs 53 Crore per kilometre, now hangs in balance, after the union government asked the NHAI to stop the construction earlier this month.
The instructions were passed after local BJP member of parliament, Jugal Kishore Sharma led a delegation to Union Minister for Road Transport and Highways Nitin Gadkari and demanded that the construction of the blind wall on the approximately 8-kilometre-long road stretch between Kunjwani and Narwal, as part of the Expressway should not be built, as desired by the people of Jammu, mainly traders and businessmen.
The original construction plan had the provisions of blind wall on the stretch.
The decision was welcomed by people in Jammu, who had earlier feared serious ramifications due to severing of vital connections between commercial establishments, residences, and various community-centric spaces due to blind walls on both sides of the expressway.
The proposed construction designs had the potential to impact approximately 502 commercial establishments, including 365 shops, 10 vehicle showrooms, 37 godowns, 5 schools, 65 office spaces, 7 hospitals, 5 malls, and 8 shops in sheds, along with many other households.
However, the NHAI had to stop the construction work after the government changed its mind, and this part ‘indecisiveness’ and part ‘short-sightedness’ on the part of the government has cost the public exchequer a loss of several hundred crores.
The ambitious 650 km Delhi – Amritsar – Katra (DAK) expressway project by NHAI seeks to construct a 4-lane access-controlled road with a route alignment connecting Jasaur Kheri, Jhajjar District near Delhi with Katra north of Jammu city.
Announced in 2016, the project has been divided into 18 tenders/sections/packages and the stretch from Kunjwani to Narwal falls into the package 17.
The Package 17 in Jammu & Kashmir further consists of 2 disjointed parts – a 13.3 km brownfield section of NH-44 which will be upgraded between Kunjwani and Sidhra and a 15.62 km greenfield section between Domel and Katra.
The contract for the Package 17 was awarded in August 2022 at the cost of Rs. 1557.51 crore, averaging out to be Rs 53 Crore per Kilometre, with a deadline of two years.
With deadline approaching and work halted, the fate of Kunjwani-Narwal stretch hangs in balance.
The issue of blind walls was raised with the government ever since the work on the project started in 2023, with several delegations and organisations leading protests and meeting the concerned officials calling for the removal of blind walls from the stretch.
In the first week of January 2024, when the work on this stretch was yet to pick up pace, a delegation had called upon Gadkari, who had assured them that he would order necessary instructions in this regard.
However, nothing of that sort came from Gadkari’s office and the NHAI continued the construction work, gaining great progress for next six month, when in July 2024, the instructions finally came.
As has been the case with a number of examples, this has caused a significant loss to the public exchequer and once again, there is no accountability to be fixed. If only the government had thought its construction plans through, or had listened to the grievances of people of Jammu well in time, this loss—running in crores of rupees, could have been avoided.
