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Centre tilts towards AP on road projects
Even as the newly-carved State is crying hoarse that it is not getting a fair deal from the Centre, the residuary State of Andhra Pradesh has got a benevolent gesture from its ally at the Centre on road connectivity projects. This has miffed the Telangana government, which has been reminding the Centre to upgrade its road network as promised under the 13th Schedule of the AP Reorganisation Act.
- Fails to honour 13th Schedule on road connectivity
- No progress on 1000-km SH stretches’ improvement
- But approves upgradation of 700-km SH to NH in AP
Hyderabad: Even as the newly-carved State is crying hoarse that it is not getting a fair deal from the Centre, the residuary State of Andhra Pradesh has got a benevolent gesture from its ally at the Centre on road connectivity projects. This has miffed the Telangana government, which has been reminding the Centre to upgrade its road network as promised under the 13th Schedule of the AP Reorganisation Act.
Despite the assurances given under the 13th Schedule that a stretch of 1000 km of State Highways (SH) in Telangana would be upgraded as National Highways (NH) nothing has moved forward so far. During the last one year, the Telangana government had written several letters to the Centre in this regard, according to Roads and Buildings (National Highways) Chief Engineer I Ganapathi Reddy. Chief Minister K Chandrashekar Rao himself wrote three letters.
This was followed by a meeting between R&B Minister Tummala Nageswara Rao and Union Minister Nitin Gadkari in New Delhi recently. However, the official said no assurance had come from the Union minister. “We will examine the issue,” is all that Gadkari informed Tummala.
The government had proposed to develop the National Highways on six stretches covering 1000 km, Hyderabad– Medak- Bodhan- Banswada- Bhainsa, Hyderabad– Chevella- Kodangal- Parigi, Jadcherla- Kalwakurthi- Deverakonda- Miryalaguda- Kodad, Khammam- Suryapeta- Aswaraopeta, Karimnagar- Kamareddy- Yellareddy- Pitala and between Nirmal to Jagityal via Khanapur.
The stretches will connect all the backward districts -- Mahbubnagar, Nalgonda, Adilabad, Medak and Khammam. Seeming to rub the salt into the wounds of Telangana, the Centre had approved conversion of 700-km stretch of the State Highway into National Highway in Andhra Pradesh, though it was not mentioned in the 13th Schedule, according to sources.
With this, the highway road network in AP has increased to 4,900 km from the existing 4,200 km in Andhra Pradesh. The Centre had promised to improve the road network in Telangana in view of low density of highway network in the State. The density of highway network in Telangana was only 2.2 (2.2 km highway per 1 lakh people) as against the national average of 2.8 km.
Another distressing fact is that Telangana stood last among other states in south India in maintaining highway density.
By:Patan Afzal Babu
