U.S promises support, cooperation to India in road sector: Gadkari

By Anshul Rana Washington D.C (United States), July 12 (ANI): Union Road Transport and Highways Minister Nitin Gadkari on Tuesday said the U.S. has extended its support and cooperation to India in road and transport sector. "We have discussed road engineering, because for flyovers and concrete pyramids there are rules and regulations for the construction. They offered us that they will give us all technical cooperation for standardisation of our 'Indian core' for road construction, bridges and flyovers," Gadkari told ANI. Gadkari, who is on a week-long visit to the U.S. with the aim to attract Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) for the infrastructure sector, said the U.S. is ready to share all kind of manuals and rules and regulations with India. "The U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Authority is ready to cooperate with us. I feel it is a big task for the Indian Government, particularly for my department, that we can save the life of people, because this number is very big," he added. Asserting that inland waterways is also one of the important subjects in India, the minister said the government has already passed a bill in Parliament. "My two meetings with the Business Councils were very nice. We offered them that it is a golden opportunity for the investors to invest in India. Indian scenario has totally changed. When our government and Prime Minister Narendra Modi took charge, we decided that we would give highest priority to infrastructure development," he added. Gadkari further said the Government of India has within two years constructed 20 kms of road per day. "We have already signed the road contact for more than 18,000 km. We have taken decision to convert our national highway from 96,000 km to 2 lakh km. Out of it, we have already cleared 55,000 as national highway," he added. In a bid to woo the investors, Gadkari said there is a huge opportunity for them for investment in the road sector. "We have four types of road construction modes - PPP, POT, BOT, NOT, and then an EPC and NOT hybrid is also there. So, we explained all type of plans in the road sector. We talked particularly about the Sagarmala project, where we are expecting 12 lakh crores of investment," he added. He said the government is very soon going to implement the Sagarmala project. "In Indian scenario, our logistic cost is 18 percent and that is one of the obstacles for our exports. In China, it is 8 percent, and in European countries it is 8-12 percent. So, by creating this coastal transport and transport inland waterways, we can reduce the cost up to 12 percent. Only then it will be possible for us to fulfil 'Make in India' dream of our honourable Prime Minister," he added. (ANI)