Funny Rides
April 24, 2012
Now road toll can be paid without stopping at plazas
April 20, 2012
Union Minister for Road Transport and Highways C.P. Joshi on Thursday unveiled India’s first Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technology-based Electronic Toll Collection (ETC) Plaza at Chandimandir here. He also inaugurated the four-lane Zirakpur-Parwanoo section of National Highway 5 passing through Punjab, Haryana and Himachal Pradesh.
Calling for coordinated efforts by the Central and State governments for making India a developed nation, Dr. Joshi said: “A qualitative infrastructure development is the need of the hour.”
Stating that a thrust to infrastructure development had been given in the 11th and coming 12th Five-Year Plans to increase the national Gross Domestic Product, he said the endeavour was to facilitate the common man with new technology and better road transportation facilities.
Dr. Joshi said all the highways in the country would be enabled with RFID technique that “helps users to pay the toll tax without stopping at toll plazas and reduces traffic congestion and commuting time.”
“Toll statements can also be made available online to the road users and they need not stop for the receipt,” he added.
He said his Ministry would consider giving exemptions and concessions to a certain category of users as per the request of Haryana Chief Minister Bhupinder Singh Hooda and his Punjab counterpart, Parkash Singh Badal, besides that of Union Culture Minister Kumari Selja and Haryana PWD Minister Randeep Singh Surjewala.
Dr. Joshi, however, asserted that the need of the hour was to rise above populism as the companies which had created huge infrastructure had to recover their costs through toll collection.
Referring to the “bottlenecks” faced by residents of Panchkula, he said these would be technically examined.
He disclosed that the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) has completed projects worth Rs. 1,913 crore in Haryana, Rs. 1,419 crore in Punjab and Rs. 50 crore in Himachal Pradesh. He added that the NHAI would take up major road projects measuring 1,167 km in Haryana, Punjab and Himachal Pradesh during the current financial year.
Mr. Hooda said this project would benefit the people of Haryana, Punjab and Himachal Pradeshas they would not have to face traffic jams on the highway. He urged the Union Minister to formally approve various roads in Haryana as National Highways which had been approved in-principle.
Local MP Kumari Selja demanded the conversion of the Saha-Ambala stretch into a national highway.
Mr. Badal stated that the payment of toll, though unpalatable to the public, had become a necessity and there was no way out.
RFID tags
Meanwhile, ICICI Bank officials said the bank was working with the toll operators for issuing RFID tags to road users to be read at the toll plazas. Users, who need to register themselves, could use the tags across multiple toll plazas; they could be updated and would act as a record for settlement of financial transactions of the toll operators.
KNR Constructions completes NHAI project in record time
April 19, 2012
HYDERABAD: Hyderabad-based construction firmKNR Constructions has completed the Bijapur-Hungund toll road of National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) nearly 11 months ahead of schedule and claimed it a record in the history of Indian highways.
The four lining of 97.22 kilometres of road project, valued at Rs 905.5 crore, was completed in 582 days as against the scheduled duration of 910 days.
NHAI had awarded the project on design, build, finance, operate and transfer (DBFOT) basis to a special purpose vehicle of Sadbhav Engineering, which in turn awarded the project to KNR Constructions, an EPC (engineering, procurement and construction) contracting firm.
“The primary motivation to complete the project much ahead of schedule was the attraction of earning a bonus of Rs 16 lakh per every single day of early completion. In the process, we ended up with earning a bonus of around Rs 50 crore for early completion,” Executive Director K. Jalandhar Reddy told ET.
As a part of achieving the target, he said, the company has paid additional compensation to the land owners towards expeditious land acquisition, apart from deploying modern imported construction equipment and adopting best sourcing and keeping a strong supply chain of raw material.
“Most of the concessionaries are bagging the road projects these days at very thin margins owing to aggressive bidding and early execution of projects by EPC contractors will significantly help them improve their financials,” said Reddy.
Further, he said in the backdrop of not securing BOT road projects from NHAI owing to not so aggressive bidding strategy, KNR will now focus largely on EPC road contracts and help the BOT players with its strong execution skills.
KNR, with Rs 1,051 crore revenue last fiscal, now has an order book of Rs 3,396 crore comprising of Rs 3,253 crore of road EPC contracts, said Reddy.
Source: http://economictimes.indiatimes.com
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April 18, 2012
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At 8,000 kms, Road Ministry awards 57% more work in FY12
April 3, 2012
NEW DELHI: Road ministry has ended the year on a high as it has awarded 62 projects covering 7,957 kms in the current fiscal, 57% higher than the previous year. The government is all set to achieve its earlier announced target of building 20 kms of road per day by 2013-14, as it has completed construction of 2,250 kms road in 2011-12, in comparison to 1,784 kms in the previous year.
In 2011-12, National Highways Authority of India(NHAI) has awarded 49 projects of 6,491 kms and the ministry awarded 13 projects for 1466 kms through state agencies. In all, 62 projects of 7,400 kms have already been awarded as against the target of 7,300 kms.
Some of the projects awarded have offered premium to the government and is likely to result in additional revenue generation of Rs 30,400 crore during the concession period.
“We want to accelerate this achievement further in 2012-13. We are confident of achieving the target of 8800 kms, said CP Joshi, Union Minister of Road, Transport and Highways. Joshi added that bids for 1,500 kms are either under evaluation or due in April,2012.
In the recent bids, which opened on March 28 and March 30, NHAI received a phenomenal response with road project developers providing premium on seven projects that would earn Rs 6,451 crore whereas one project sought a premium.
Companies like L&T, Sadbhav Engineering and IVRCL were amongst some of the successful bidders for 8 projects entailing highway development of 1,144 kms, having an estimated cost of Rs 11,500 crore. IVRCL will provide the highest premium at Rs 145 crore. “The bids are far better than what we had anticipated. Even the single project which asked for grant, it was much lesser than our estimates,” said an NHAI official.
These companies have opted to provide premium to the government, instead of taking viability gap funding. The government provides VGF or grant to the project developers for ensuring viability of the projects.
L&T won two bids and thus would be completing the full stretch from Gujarat border to Amravati. This road connects Hazira port -Surat to Paradip and eventually Kolkata.
In addition, 3 projects in NHAI of 318 Kms. and 5 projects in the Ministry of 664 Kms. i.e. 982 Kms. in all, bids have been received, which are under evaluation and decision is to be taken soon. It is possible that the government may award a few hundred kms if some of these projects are cleared tomorrow.
Ministry bid to meet highway target is a boon for infra cos
April 2, 2012
The timing chosen by the Highways Ministry — the last four days of the fiscal just ended — to open bids worth Rs 11,564 crore would end up fattening the order-books of many listed infrastructure companies, apart from helping the ruling UPA-II alliance meet its target of awarding 7,400 km of highways.
“In what may be an unprecedented move, the Highways Ministry and NHAI issued the Letters of Intent (LoI) the very next day after the bids were opened, that too on a Saturday, a Government holiday. The LoIs will help companies book orders, and maybe earn revenues, for fiscal 2011-12 — without raising any eyebrows. Earlier, firms have booked orders without LoIs in hand, but with a disclosure.
The listed companies that gained from the year-ender round of bidding include Larsen & Toubro Infrastructure, Unity Infraprojects, IVRCL and Sadbhav Engineering. Over Rs 7,600 crore of projects, or 65 per cent of total bids opened, were bagged by firms listed on the stock exchanges.
IMPACT ON L&T
With these bids, Larsen and Toubro, the parent firm of the largest beneficiary of these bids, L&T Infrastructure, will inch closer to achieving its order-book guidance of five per cent year-on-year growth. L&T Infra grabbed projects worth Rs 4,500 crore, or 40 per cent of the bids opened in value terms, was the largest gainer from the last four days of bids.
“As on March 30, L&T (parent company) required about Rs 34,340 crore inflows in the fourth quarter of fiscal 2012 to achieve its stated guidance,” an analyst of a brokerage firm tracking L&T told Business Line, requesting anonymity as he is not permitted to speak to media.
In the nine months ended December 2012, L&T had reported inflows of Rs 49,420 crore, which implies flat year-on-year growth. Even before these bids were opened on March 30, L&T had announced orders of Rs 12,090 crore during the fourth quarter of financial 2012, added the analyst.
Due to these bids, order-books of Sadbhav Engineering would increase by Rs 1,102.48 crore, IVRCL Rs 1,617 crore and Unity Infraprojects Rs 438.75 crore.
SPECIAL RELAXATION
These projects, which would help develop 1,100 km of highways, were a part of the Highway Ministry’s award list firmed up early in fiscal 2012. But to ensure that the projects did not spill over to FY 2013, an empowered Group of Ministers (eGoM) stepped in to allow relaxation of a required approval process.
The relaxation ensured that the Ministry could approach the Cabinet Committee of Infrastructure directly for approval, instead of the Public Private Partnership Appraisal Committee (PPPAC). The Highways Ministry made this proposal a day after Mr Pulok Chatterjee asked it to expedite awarding 15 major projects requiring construction of 1,547 km during fiscal 2012.
The mandatory PPPAC approval for these projects had got delayed for months. The Highways Ministry was informed that the nod was getting delayed because the appraisal note had not come in from the Planning Commission, one of the members of the PPPAC. This made the Ministry escalate the issue as it was affecting project targets.
This relaxation has helped the UPA-II Government achieve its target of awarding highway projects of 7,300 km, with the Finance Minister, Mr Pranab Mukherjee, announcing in the Budget that the Government is on track to meet its target of awarding 7,300 km of highways.
The bidding process did follow the annual pre-qualification and e-tendering methodologies, both aimed at removing discretionary powers and increasing competition.
Source: http://www.thehindubusinessline.com
Highway construction goes into top gear
April 2, 2012
NHAI hastens award of projects covering 5,400 km this financial year, road construction increases to 7 km a day
The pace of road construction in the first three years of the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government’s second term has increased to seven km a day, compared with 4.1 km a day in the previous three years. However, this is still below the ambitious 20-km a day target set by the government.
Officials said so far, the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) has awarded projects covering about 5,400 km in this financial year, against a target of awarding 59 projects covering 7,300 km, with a total cost of about Rs 60,000 crore. The authority is expected to hasten the award of projects in the next few days to come as close to the target as possible
In the last three years of UPA’s first term — 2006-07, 2007-08 and 2008-09 — NHAI constructed 4,522 km of highways. This increased to 7,758 km in the first three years of the current term.
At about 2,100 km, 2011-12 would see the lowest national highway construction in the last four financial years. A senior NHAI official said, “We will be able to construct 2,100 km of roads this year. This year’s construction is low because of less number of awards in 2008-09. Our award plans went haywire in 2008-09 because of the recession in the global market.” He added the completion of projects by the authority was below the target of 2,500 km of highways in the current financial year.
The award and construction of road projects had slowed during the first term of the UPA government. While the economic slowdown and the ensuing liquidity crunch had hit performance and kept companies away, T R Baalu’s record as the road transport minister was also not satisfactory.
In mid-2009, UPA came to power for the second time and Kamal Nath was appointed surface transport minister. He had set a target of 20 km a day, increasing it from the target six km a day in 2008-09. During his tenure, Nath had come up with project plans for two financial years and had set a target of awarding a little over 200 projects, worth Rs 200,000 crore. The pace of awarding road projects and construction of roads improved under the new minister, C P Joshi.
The highways authority has also awarded over 21 projects on premium that is expected to fetch around Rs 3,000 crore a year. A company offering a premium shows it is committing to an annual payment to the government over a period of time, instead of seeking a grant for building roads. Companies bid a premium if these are confident the accruing toll revenue would more-than-offset their costs.
The premium income is also set to bring down NHAI’s borrowing. It would now have to borrow only Rs 83,000 crore till 2030-31. The B K Chaturvedi committee, appointed in 2009 to examine the National Highways Development Programme and related aspects (it gave its second report last year), had said NHAI would need to raise Rs 191,000 crore by 2030-31.
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