In bid to speed up highway building in the country, the Central government is contemplating easing the mandatory 80% land acquisition before highways construction starts, said official sources, claiming that the condition could be relaxed to 50% mandatory land acquisition and the ministry is all set to take final decision on this score. The land acquisition process for any project currently takes around one and a half year on an average and in any project, structures such as bridges and flyovers take the maximum time and now the proposal is to award projects when 50% land is already available and start the construction work. As a matter of fact, the land acquisition process doesn't face too many problems in states such as Andhra Pradesh, Karnataka, Tamil Nadu, Telangana and Gujarat, whereas, in states such as Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and West Bengal it takes time. In addition, the ministry has also decided not to acquire land before the harvest season as it unnecessarily leads to creation of hurdles for farmers, therefore, delaying the handover of land, they added.
