Govt plans 44 cross-country economic corridors

As many as 44 cross-country economic corridors have been planned under the ambitious Bharatmala scheme and all these corridors will be linked through expressways as the government intends to facilitate seamless trade by reducing the distance between cities, and saving cost, time, and fuel. Corridors include Delhi-Vadodara, Chennai-Salem, Ambala-Kotputli and Raipur-Visakhapatnam. Recently, the NIIF had announced its foray into the highway sector by partnering with the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways and the NHAI. It is learnt that the NIIF will invest ₹15,000-crore in the Delhi-Mumbai expressway project and this investment would be leveraged to generate about ₹50,000 crore. The project cost is ₹70,000 crore where the entire construction risk would be borne by the NHAI. This arrangement essentially means that the ownership of the project would be with the NIIF. Currently, the Abu Dhabi Investment Authority is a partner with the NIIF, which was formed by the Indian government as a private entity. The proposed Delhi-Mumbai expressway would also be connected to the industrial city of Indore and an arm of the erstwhile Golden Quadrilateral.