The Maharashtra State Road Development Corporation (MSRDC) has said that around 80 per cent of the required land for the construction of the 704-km-long Mumbai-Nagpur Expressway has already been acquired. It has also said that the work orders for the construction of Expressway will be given by June and the groundwork will start after the monsoons.
The civil construction work is pegged at around Rs 30,000 crore and the overall cost of the project is Rs 46,000 crore. The MSRDC has also said that the loan of around Rs 1,500 crore offered by the South Korean government is not sufficient for the project.
An MSRDC official, said, "The loan amount offered by South Korea was not even touching Rs 1,500 crore and our civil construction is of Rs 30,000 crore. Also, the conditions of the loan are not agreeable to us."
Last year, the state government had signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) with the government of South Korea to financially aid the state's infrastructure projects which included the Mumbai-Nagpur Expressway, also known as the Samruddhi Corridor.
The MSRDC official added, " We are going to prepare a map to find out how scattered the current acquisition of land is. The financial bids are also expected to be opened in the next week."
The MSRDC requires around 10,000 hectares of land for the construction of the Expressway and is acquiring land either under the land acquisition Act or by offering land pooling model wherein landholders are made partners in the project.
The construction of the 704-km-long Expressway touted to be the longest Expressway in South Asia, is divided into 16 civil packages wherein separate contractors will be appointed for each package. This is being done to ensure the speedy completion of the project wherein those contractors who finish work before deadline gets a bonus of up to 5 per cent.
