Mumbai: Lokmat, Maharashtra’s leading newspaper, has organized ‘Lokmat Infra Conclave – A Roadmap to the future’ as a part of Lokmat Knowledge Forum. Through this conclave, Lokmat highlighted the opportunities and obstacles for India and Maharashtra in terms of infrastructure development.
Industry stalwarts across various sectors through 3 panel discussions presented their issues challenges and the future roadmap. The Conclave has been powered by Topworth, supported by Ministry of Road Transport and Highways, Ministry of Shipping, Govt. of India, Govt. of Maharashtra, Knowledge Partner – YES Bank.
The Lokmat YES Bank Infrastructure Report was launched by Union Minister Sri Nitin Gadkari, Vijay Darda, Chairman, Lokmat, Mr. Sanjay Palve, Sr. Group President-Corporate Finance, Govt. Banking & Loans Syndication, YES Bank, Capt. BV JK Sharma, JMD & CEO, JSW Infrastructure, Mr. Raghav Chandra, IAS, Chairman, NHAI, Mr. Jayant Mhaiskar, Vice Chairman & MD, MEP Infrastructure and Mr. Abhay Lodha, Chairman, Topworth
Highlighting the objective behind this conclave, Mr. Vijay Darda, Chairman, Lokmat Media Pvt. Ltd., said that, “We at Lokmat are privileged to host this special event and would like to thank Mr. Nitin Gadkari, Mr. Devendra Fadnavis & other key guests and delegates for making it a success. We have always voiced the opinions and concerns of our readers and today’s Lokmat Infra Conclave is a unique platform to help our readers understand the challenges and concerns regarding Infrastructure Development in India. Through this conclave we intend to provide a platform, bringing Government and Industry leaders together and come up with the future roadmap along with some rare unique announcements to redefine infrastructure in India.”
Delivering keynote address at the Conclave, Mr. Nitin Gadkari said, “I am really grateful to Lokmat media for organizing an Infrastructure conclave. A platform like this helps us connect with the common people and address their concerns.
India stands second in terms of road sector. The first revolutionary decision taken by our government was to increase the length of the road for national highway from 96,000 kilometers to 2 lakh kilometer. With this step, we aim that most of the traffic is on national highway. There has been an increase in the number of accidents by 4% when our government took over and Road engineering is one of the main reasons behind the increase in the number of accidents. We are working towards it and in the next 5 years we plan to bring down the number of road accidents by 50%.”
Mr. Nitin Gadkari further added that, “We have also introduced e-governance in our system, which has led to fast approvals, time efficiency, and less dependency. On January 1, 2017 we are starting the construction of Baroda – Mumbai expressway worth Rs 12,000 crore, which will connect Mumbai and Ahmedabad. We are also starting work on Butibori in Nagpur and Ratnagiri road worth Rs. 12,000 crore. By 2018, we plan to complete construction of four-lane Mumbai – Goa road. We are constructing Alandi-Pandharpur and Dehu-Pandharpur four lane cement concrete Palkhi marg worth Rs 10,000 crore with amenities available for pilgrims. We are also making 6 new ports in India.”
A stock of infrastructure facilities in the state and their future planning was taken during this conclave. Mr. Sanjay Palve, Sr. Group President-Corporate Finance, Govt. Banking & Loans Syndication, YES Bank; Capt. BV JK Sharma, JMD & CEO, JSW Infrastructure, Mr. Raghav Chandra, IAS, Chairman, NHAI, Mr. Jayant Mhaiskar, Vice Chairman & MD, MEP Infrastructure and Mr. Abhay Lodha, Chairman Topworth discussed on the road infrastructure of the Maharashtra. This panel was moderated by Tarun Nangia of News World
