Dehradun: The Uttarakhand government is promoting road connectivity in rural areas. In the sequence, 519 roads i.e. a total of 1481 km of road has been constructed in rural areas within the last three years. Due to which road has reached 35 villages with a population of more than 250. Along with this, 195 bridges were constructed during this period. Apart from this, 61 rural roads of 159 km length already built were repaired and upgraded. About Rs 2310 crore has been spent on the construction of all these roads and bridges.
The works of the first and second phases under the Pradhan Mantri Gramin Sadak Yojana are almost complete. Along with this, approval of Rs 1824 crore has been received from the Government of India for the upgradation of already constructed roads under the third phase of PMGSY. Under this, a total of 2288 km long roads are to be upgraded. Along with this, under the Vibrant Village Scheme, approval of Rs 119 crore has been issued by the Government of India to connect eight settlements deprived of roads. In the state, only 1796 settlements with less than 150 population are left where roads have not reached.
In fact, the Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana was started in December 2000 by the then Atal Bihari Vajpayee government at the Center. The main objective of the scheme was to connect villages with roads, however, in this scheme 90 percent is funded by the Center and 10 percent is contributed by the state government. Since the start of the scheme, construction of a total of 2329 roads and 312 bridges has been completed in Uttarakhand. So far, about Rs 10,183 crore has been spent on the scheme. Under this scheme, 1846 settlements with a population of more than 250 have been connected by road.
Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami said that with the inspiration of PM Narendra Modi, work is being done rapidly on the Pradhan Mantri Gramin Sadak Yojana to connect villages with roads. Roads are the basis of progress of any state and region, which is why the state government is determined to provide roads to all rural areas.
