The state Cabinet chaired by Chief Minister Mr Eknath Shinde on Thursday gave a nod to the Maharashtra State Road Development Corporation (MSRDC) to raise a loan worth Rs 35,629 crore for land acquisition needed for a slew of transport infrastructure projects.
Initially, MSRDC will raise Rs 5,640 crore from HUDCO as per today’s cabinet nod.
The Chief Minister’s Office said that the guarantee required for this will be given by the state government. For this, budgetary provisions will be made to repay the loan and the interest thereon. The cabinet also gave approval for the proceeds from the sale of plots by the MSRDC to be used for loan repayment. The tenure of this loan will be 15 years.
The MSRDC vice chairman and managing director Mr Radheshyam Mopalwar told the Free Press Journal, ‘’MSRDC will mobilise necessary funds by raising loans for land acquisition of three major projects including Virar-Alibaug Multimodal Corridor Project (MMC), Pune Ring Road and Jalna-Nanded Expressway. The loan will be raised from HUDCO and other financial institutions.’’
Mr Mopalwar said that The Virar Alibaug Multimodal Corridor will cost Rs 55,000 crore, the Pune Ring Road Rs 30,000 crore and the Jalna Nanded Expressway Rs 22,000 crore. ‘’Of the Rs 55,000 crore cost, the land acquisition portion will be worth Rs 22,000 crore for the Virar Alibaug Multimodal Corridor. Total land acquisition will be 1,000 hectare for the first phase with 98.5 km length. For the Pune Ring Road, of the Rs 30,000 crore cost, land portion will be Rs 11,000 crore. Nearly 2,000 hectares will be acquired for the project. In case of Jalna Nanded Expressway, 2,000 hectares will be acquired and of the total cost of Rs 22,000 crore, land portion will be Rs 2,900 crore,’’ he added.
Meanwhile, the cabinet also approved scrapping penal action initiated by the revenue machinery with regard to use of secondary minerals in the construction of the 701 km Mumbai Nagpur Samruddhi Mahamarg.
The Chief Minister’s Office said that the exemption was granted for imposition of leviable property on mining of secondary minerals required for this highway. However, in some cases, the hearing of appeals filed by the concerned contractors before various authorities against the orders of penal action is still going on. In some cases, the revenue machinery has started recovery proceedings. Since this penal action was not taken as per the prescribed directions, it was decided to quash the order of penal action.
Similarly, all pending cases regarding penal action before the revenue machinery have also been cancelled.
