“Within a year, the road condition between Pune and Kolhapur would improve and the travel time would come down gradually,” said Nitin Gadkari, Union Minister for Road Transport, on Thursday.
While responding to an issue raised by NCP (SP) MP Supriya Sule in Parliament on the condition of the highway and the fatal accidents at the Navale bridge, Gadkari said, “The National Highway Authority of India (NHAI) has changed the developer of the Satara-Pune road stretch and appointed a new one to speed up the development of the road.”
Gadkari further added, “The Central Government has undertaken a fresh survey of the national highway stretch between Pune and Satara. And initiatives are being taken to improve the road conditions. Rs 6,000 crores are earmarked to resolve the issues, and the remaining work will be taken up on the highway soon.”
“To provide an alternative route to bypass Khambatki Ghat, a new tunnel is being constructed, and one lane will soon be opened for traffic, which would reduce the travel time from Pune to Satara,” Gadkari said.
He further said that the work on the Satara-Kolhapur stretch heading towards Bengaluru was going on, adding that a few technical problems had been resolved. The condition of the Pune-Kolhapur highway will thus improve drastically in a year.
“The Union roads and highway ministry had taken steps to improve the Navale Bridge road stretch on the Katraj Bypass along the Mumbai-Bengaluru highway. The number of accidents has reduced, but there was a fatal accident recently. And there is a need for an accident-free road,” Sule stated.
