12-01-2007, 02:26 AM
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin--><b>Speedbreaker in charge </b>
The Pioneer Edit Desk
Can highways survive Baalu?
Friday's front page report in this newspaper on the abysmal progress of the highway development and road upgrade programme over the past year is a reality-check for booming India. It is well-known that in the three years of the UPA Government the National Highways Development Programme (NHDP) and the Golden Quadrilateral -- meant to fast-track, literally, connectivity between the four metropolitan zones of the country -- have been delayed considerably. Vital for economic acceleration in the North-East, the East-West corridor is now three years behind schedule. It was meant to be completed this month but is expected to be ready not before December 2010. Admittedly, not all the blame can be laid at the doors of the Centre. State Governments have been mixed in their support for road development and in helping the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) acquire land. Yet, it has to be said that the Road Transport and Highways Ministry and the NHAI have suffered under a Minister who lacks the missionary zeal that made his predecessor, Mr BC Khanduri, an iconic new-age political administrator. It is worth asking why the very departments and officers that were so successful under Mr Khanduri have had poor report cards under the present incumbent, Mr TR Baalu. The reasons are not economic or technical; they are related to politics and political ownership.
In the NDA years, the then Prime Minister, Mr Atal Bihari Vajpayee, made highway augmentation his vision statement, his legacy project. This was not unusual. Political leaders and chief executives often link their terms in office to blockbuster achievements. In his years in office, Mr Vajpayee gave his Minister-in-charge, Mr Khanduri, leeway for contractual innovation to bring about genuine public-private partnerships: Reward performing contractors and punish laggards and so create an incentive for quick completion of the NHDP. Business analysts praised the NHAI for transparency in its contracts system and saw it as a model for other infrastructure-related sectors. <span style='font-size:14pt;line-height:100%'>The UPA experience has been decidedly different. In any standard State Government the roads department is a "lucrative" one: There is money to be made by awarding contracts to firms that build sub-standard roads that have to be rebuilt the following year. Put bluntly, this has been the sort of approach Mr Baalu is comfortable with. In this scenario, institutionalised transparency -- a hallmark of the NHAI that Mr Baalu inherited -- is a nuisance.</span>
Matters cannot be allowed to rest here. The Prime Minister has often spoken of India's infrastructure deficit. Indeed, with help from the Planning Commission, his Government has devised new, innovative public-private financing mechanisms for projects in areas such as power, roads, ports and airports. Infrastructure is the buzz in the financial markets, much as IT was at the turn of the millennium. There is a lot of money -- external as well as raised in Indian markets -- being pushed into India-specific infrastructure funds. Even so, all the money in the world means nothing if the delivery system and the project implementation gateway are presided over by the types of Mr Baalu.<b> Does Mr Manmohan Singh have an answer to that? As Prime Minister, shouldn't he? </b>
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The Pioneer Edit Desk
Can highways survive Baalu?
Friday's front page report in this newspaper on the abysmal progress of the highway development and road upgrade programme over the past year is a reality-check for booming India. It is well-known that in the three years of the UPA Government the National Highways Development Programme (NHDP) and the Golden Quadrilateral -- meant to fast-track, literally, connectivity between the four metropolitan zones of the country -- have been delayed considerably. Vital for economic acceleration in the North-East, the East-West corridor is now three years behind schedule. It was meant to be completed this month but is expected to be ready not before December 2010. Admittedly, not all the blame can be laid at the doors of the Centre. State Governments have been mixed in their support for road development and in helping the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) acquire land. Yet, it has to be said that the Road Transport and Highways Ministry and the NHAI have suffered under a Minister who lacks the missionary zeal that made his predecessor, Mr BC Khanduri, an iconic new-age political administrator. It is worth asking why the very departments and officers that were so successful under Mr Khanduri have had poor report cards under the present incumbent, Mr TR Baalu. The reasons are not economic or technical; they are related to politics and political ownership.
In the NDA years, the then Prime Minister, Mr Atal Bihari Vajpayee, made highway augmentation his vision statement, his legacy project. This was not unusual. Political leaders and chief executives often link their terms in office to blockbuster achievements. In his years in office, Mr Vajpayee gave his Minister-in-charge, Mr Khanduri, leeway for contractual innovation to bring about genuine public-private partnerships: Reward performing contractors and punish laggards and so create an incentive for quick completion of the NHDP. Business analysts praised the NHAI for transparency in its contracts system and saw it as a model for other infrastructure-related sectors. <span style='font-size:14pt;line-height:100%'>The UPA experience has been decidedly different. In any standard State Government the roads department is a "lucrative" one: There is money to be made by awarding contracts to firms that build sub-standard roads that have to be rebuilt the following year. Put bluntly, this has been the sort of approach Mr Baalu is comfortable with. In this scenario, institutionalised transparency -- a hallmark of the NHAI that Mr Baalu inherited -- is a nuisance.</span>
Matters cannot be allowed to rest here. The Prime Minister has often spoken of India's infrastructure deficit. Indeed, with help from the Planning Commission, his Government has devised new, innovative public-private financing mechanisms for projects in areas such as power, roads, ports and airports. Infrastructure is the buzz in the financial markets, much as IT was at the turn of the millennium. There is a lot of money -- external as well as raised in Indian markets -- being pushed into India-specific infrastructure funds. Even so, all the money in the world means nothing if the delivery system and the project implementation gateway are presided over by the types of Mr Baalu.<b> Does Mr Manmohan Singh have an answer to that? As Prime Minister, shouldn't he? </b>
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