There has been an increase in the construction of National Highways (NHs) and roads over time, with 10,457 km of roads constructed in FY22 as compared to 6,061 km in FY16.
In FY23 (until October 2022), a total of 4,060 km of NHs and roads were constructed, which was around 91 per cent of the achievement in the corresponding period of the previous financial year, said the Economic Survey on Tuesday.
Total budgetary support for investment in the sector has been increasing rapidly in the last four years and stood at around Rs 1.4 lakh crore during FY23 (as of October 31, 2022).
The Survey said that road infrastructure in the form of a network of national highways, state highways, district roads, rural roads, and urban roads acts as a major mode of transportation and connectivity for the country's diverse population of consumers and businesses. Roads supplement the other modes of transport through last-mile connectivity to the far-flung regions of the country.
The Economic Survey also pointed out that in line with the vision of monetisation of public sector assets, National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) launched its InvIT in FY22 not only to facilitate monetisation of roads but also to attract foreign and domestic institutional investors to invest in the roads sector. So far, NHAI InvIT has raised more than Rs 10,200 crore from high quality foreign and Indian institutional investors (up to December 2022).