"State Road Caved, But I Was Blamed": Nitin Gadkari On 'Missing Link' Project

Road Transport and Highways Minister Nitin Gadkari has a grouse: his good work with expressways, roads does not get the right press. 

The Minister said he built the Mumbai-Pune Expressway 27 years ago and boasted that till date the road remains in excellent condition, adding but this news does not find any audience or is published anywhere.

"I built the Mumbai-Pune Expressway 27 years ago. To this day, not a single pothole has appeared on it; the road remains in excellent condition, yet news about this never gets published," Gadkari said, addressing the Festival of Thinkers lecture series in Pune on Monday.

The Minister said even if the road belonging to a state caves in, he is the one who is trolled on social media, hinting at the controversy around the 'Missing Link' project in Maharashtra.

"During my tenure, the Forest Department did not grant permission, so I could not construct the 'missing link' road. The state government has now built that missing link road. When issues arose with it, I was targeted on social media, even though the project was executed by the Maharashtra government," Gadkari said.

Gadkari said social media also acts as a quality control agent. 

"Social media is proving useful for quality control. It allows for the immediate identification of where things have gone wrong," Gadkari said.

The Mumbai-Pune Expressway Missing Link, which opened to traffic on May 1, is a 13-km bypass that cuts through the Sahyadri mountains, features two twin tunnels and a cable-stayed bridge. It bypasses the winding Lonavala-Khandala ghat section and is designed to reduce the travel distance by 5.7 km and cut journey time between Mumbai and Pune by 20 to 30 minutes.

The project suffered a major setback after a landslide triggered by incessant monsoon rains blocked the Pune-to-Mumbai carriageway, forcing authorities to shut the route and divert traffic. The disruption came barely nine weeks after the Rs 6,695 crore project was inaugurated, triggering sharp criticism from the Opposition over the quality of construction. 

Drawing a comparison with the construction of the Konkan Railway, Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis rejected criticism of the 'Missing Link' project and said the government would implement additional safety measures suggested by experts while asserting that the engineering achievement should not be judged by a single incident.

Underlining the importance of infrastructure, Gadkari invoked former US president John F Kennedy to stress upon the importance of roads.

"American roads are not good because America is rich, but America is rich because American roads are good," Gadkari said quoting Kennedy, adding "patchwork" will not solve the problems. 

"This is not merely about constructing roads, bridges, and tunnels; it is directly linked to economic growth," Gadkari said, spotlighting the role of good infrastructure. 

(With inputs from Yashpal Sonkamble)