TG govt draws a road map to give a big push to rural roads

Hyderabad: In a big facelift to the rural roads in Telangana, the government has decided to develop all the 17,300 kilometers of roads under Public Private Participation (PPP) mode in the Panchayat Raj Department in the State.

According to officials, the government has decided to develop roads to cover all the constituencies of the State in the next four years. It has been decided to develop a total of 17,300 kms of roads at the rate of four to five thousand kms per year as per the annual plan. There is a total road network of 68,539.27 kms under Panchayat Raj Department in the State. Out of which 26,146.83 kms are BT roads, 7,752.10 kms are WBM roads, 4,146.63 kms are CC roads, and the remaining 30493.72 kms are dirt roads.

The officials said that the present Panchayat Raj roads are laid with vehicle capacity of only 10 MT. But in the recent times, the traffic of vehicles with capacity of 25 to 30 MT has increased. Due to this, Panchayati Raj roads are getting damaged in a very short time. Roads need to be developed to meet the growing needs. Over the years, the government has not allocated sufficient funds for the maintenance and rehabilitation of Panchayat Raj roads. On the other hand, Panchayat Raj roads leading to rural areas have been damaged in many places due to continuous heavy rains. Mainly between July and September this year, all the roads were washed away due to heavy rains in many districts.

Based on the estimated losses after the recent floods and reports from various districts, the government has decided to relay 17,300 kms of roads first. It has decided to lay BT roads from each Gram Panchayat to Mandal Centre. There is a special focus on road connectivity to villages without muddy roads and metal roads. The capacity of existing roads will be increased from 10 MT to 30 MT. For the construction and relaying of these roads in the next four years, the Panchayat Raj had recently prepared a proposal with Rs 12,000 crore. About 5,000 kms roads will be laid in the year 2024-25, 4,000 kms in 2025-26, 5,000 kms in 2026-27, and 3,300 kms in 2027-28 totalling 17,300 kms of roads.

The official said that the State government was planning to take up the works of these roads in the PPP model and entrust the maintenance of these roads to the same organisation for ten years.