For plantation along the Mumbai-Nagpur Samruddhi Mahamarg 14 agencies have been prequalified. Now these pre-qualified agencies can only submit bids and the lowest quoted bid will be given the contract, said an official from the Maharashtra State Road Development Corporation(MSRDC), which is the project implementing nodal agency. The official added "Total 15 bidders we received however one found to be blacklisted and therefore 14 are confirmed pre-qualified ones. The bidding process is expected to be completed in next 8-10 days."
Along the under construction highway over 11 lakh trees will be planted which includes small and medium size plants, shrubs among others. The plantation work consist in 15 packages. As the civil work of this project is divided into 16 packages and one package consist mostly the flyovers that's why the plantation consist 15 packages informed the official.
The appointed agency expected to take care of these plantation for five years. Interestingly, the MSRDC is also making provision of drip irrigation system to ensure regular watering to the trees. Also, artificial water pools will be built in for supply of water to the plants/trees . Besides, the 24 interchanges at Samruddhi Mahamarg will also be beautified with landscape gardening among others, said the official.
At present the work of 701km long samruddhi highway is ongoing in full swing. The entire civil works expected ti be finished by next 2 years after which it will be opened to the traffic in phase wise manner. The Nagpur to Shirdi route is expected to be open by this year end reportedly. The initial proposed deadline delayed dye to Pandemic induced lockdown.
