Guwahati: The Ministries and Departments of the Central Government in the North Eastern Region (NER) have planned a variety of infrastructure development projects.
In a written reply presented to the Lok Sabha today, Shri G. Kishan Reddy Minister for Development of the North Eastern Region provided some facts.
It should be noted that during the fiscal years 2014–15 to 2021–22, 1,350 projects totaling Rs. 15,867.01 crore, including connectivity projects were approved under these development plans.
Major ongoing Capital Road Connectivity projects in NER include the 4 Laning of Dimapur-Kohima Road (62.9 km) in Nagaland; 4 laning of Nagaon bypass to Holongi (167 km) in Arunachal Pradesh; Alternate two-lane Highway from Bagrakote to Pakyong (NH-717A) (152 km) in Sikkim; 2 laning of Aizawl – Tuipang NH-54 (351 km) in Mizoram; 4 laning of Imphal, Moreh section of NH-39 (20 km) and 2-laning of 75.4 km in Manipur.
According to statistics, the Ministry of Road Transport & Highways in NER has finished 4121 km of road projects in the recent 7 years. There are currently 7545 km worth of projects that cost Rs. 1, 05,518 crore in progress.
17 airports have been made operational in the North Eastern Area. In Arunachal Pradesh, the Donyi Polo Airport (formerly Holongi Airport) was recently opened. New Greenfield airports are now being built at Tezu in Arunachal Pradesh, Dibrugarh, Guwahati, and Silchar in Assam, Imphal in Manipur, Barapani in Meghalaya, and Agartala in Tripura, among other locations.
Since 2014–15, new projects totaling 864.7 km and costing Rs. 19855 crore have been approved in the North Eastern Area. Currently, 20 projects for new and doubled lines totaling Rs. 74,485 crore for 2,011 km of length entirely or partially in the North Eastern Area are in various phases of completion.
Speaking on waterway connectivity, he mentioned that the River Brahmaputra was designated as National Waterway-2 (NW-2) in 1988 from Dhubri (the Bangladesh border) to Sadiya (891 km).
“The waterway is being developed with fairway of required depth and width, day and night navigation aids and terminals. The facilities created and planned would cost Rs.461 crore during 5 years (2020-2025). River Barak was declared as National Waterway-16 (NW -16) in the year 2016. It connects Silchar, Karimganj and Badarpur in Cachar valley of Assam with Haldia and Kolkata ports through Indo-Bangladesh Protocol (IBP) Route. The facilities created and planned would cost Rs.145 crore during 5 years (2020-2025),” he said.
Meanwhile, the Department of Telecommunications has also started working on a number of projects in the North Eastern States to improve telecom access there.