As the policy states, the vision is to develop eco friendly national highways with the participation of local communities, NGOs, private sector institutions, and government agencies including forest departments.
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The Government will launch its Green Highways Policy tomorrow that will make it mandatory for road developers to set aside 1 per cent of the total project cost for plantation, a scheme that is likely to see Rs 1,000 crore under the green corpus this fiscal. Gadkari also promised to introduce electric bikes, scooters and buses in Indian market within two years.
The policy aims to create a green belt alongside 100,000km of national highways and also hopes to generate around 500,000 jobs in the rural sector. “Those who are not serious should refrain from participating in the scheme”, the Minister said. He said that about Rs 1000 crore per year will be available for plantation goal, according to an official release. He said the government was against felling of trees for building highways and the existing trees would be transplanted, while the bodies desirous of working in this direction would be given assistance to purchase machinery. “But please remember that your earnings will depend on the survival of the trees planted by you”, the minister said while stressing that the monitoring of such projects will be done through satellite technology.
The policy – “Green Highways (plantation, transplantation, beautification and maintenance) policy, 2015” – was released by Road Transport and Highways Minister Nitin Gadkari.
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Fast-tracking of projects could be made possible because of expediting decision-making process as well as policy interventions, the Road Transport and Highways Minister said. With the green highways policy, experts said around 175,000 hectares of forest area can be added. The green cover will also become one of the parameters to rate the national highway or state highways in future. The Indian road network 48 lakh km is the second largest in the world and consists of about 96,000 kms of NHs, which constitute only 2 percent of the road network but carry about 40 percent of the total road traffic.
