Union Minister T.R. Baalu

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The National Waterway III between Kochi and Kollam will be fully functional by March 2009, Union Minister for Shipping, Road Transport and Highways T.R. Baalu said here on Wednesday.

Briefing presspersons after a review of national highways and shipping projects in Kerala, with Chief Minister V.S. Achuthanandan, the Ministers T.U. Kuruvilla and Mathew T. Thomas and MPs from the State, the Union Minister said Rs. 71 crore would be spent on the project, mainly on dredging the waterway and providing mechanised cargo-handling terminals. The waterway between Kalady and Kottappuram in Ernakulam district would be linked to National Waterway III, he added.

Mr. Baalu said widening 851 km of national highways in Kerala to four lanes would be taken up under a public-private participation scheme, and the work had reached the bidding stage. The Union Government had accepted the State Government's proposal that land for highway development be acquired at rates at which land was acquired by it for other purposes. Kerala was the only State which had resisted public-private participation.

Referring to Kerala's objections to it, he said such projects were under implementation in all other States, including West Bengal.

He said the National Highway Authority of India (NHAI) had secured approval for development of the Walayar-Vadakkanchery stretch of the National Highway Development Project (NHDP III) and the 87-km Vadakkanchery-Thrissur stretch of National Highway 47. Sethu Samudram

He defended the Sethu Samudram Project and, replying to a question, accused the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) of misrepresentation of facts to further its communal agenda.

Earlier, addressing the meeting, the Chief Minister opposed pubic-private participation for highway development, and urged the Union Minister to go in for construction of roads using Central funds and annuity schemes. He urged the Minister to sanction a regional office of the NHAI in Thiruvananthapuram.

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