NEW DELHI, Feb 28: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday said the PM Gati Shakti plan will give a new direction to the development of modern infrastructure through planning, implementation and monitoring, besides cutting down on time and cost overruns of projects.
He also asked the corporates to partner with the government and increase investments and contribute in the development of the country.
The PM Gati Shakti – National Master Plan was announced last year with an aim to break departmental silos and bring in more holistic and integrated planning and execution of projects with a view to address the issues of multi-modal and last-mile connectivities.
“Infrastructure planning, implementation and monitoring will get a new direction from PM Gati Shakti. This will also bring down the time and cost overrun of the projects,” he said while addressing a post-budget webinar on vision of ‘Gati Shakti’.
The PM Gati Shakti will also ensure true public-private partnership in infrastructure creation from infrastructure planning to development and utilisation stage, the Prime Minister noted.
This year’s budget, he said, has set the pace of India’s development in the 21st century and this direction of infrastructure-based development will lead to an extraordinary increase in the strength of the Indian economy and create many new possibilities of employment.
He underlined the lack of coordination among the stakeholders in the traditional ways of completing projects.
“This was due to lack of clear information among the various concerned departments. Due to PM Gati Shakti, now everyone will be able to make their plan with complete information. This will also lead to optimum utilisation of the country’s resources,” he added.
Emphasising on the importance of PM Gati Shakti initiative, he said in 2013-14, the direct capital expenditure of the Government of India was about Rs 2.50 lakh crore, which has increased to Rs 7.5 lakh crore in 2022-23.
“Strengthening the principle of cooperative federalism, our government has made a provision of Rs 1 lakh crore for the assistance of the states in this year’s budget. State governments will be able to use this amount on multimodal infrastructure and other productive assets,” Modi said adding the National Ropeway Develo-pment Programme will help improve connectivity in the inaccessible hilly areas.
He informed that in the PM Gati Shakti – National Master Plan, “more than 400 data layers are available now, informing not just the existing and proposed infrastructure but also information about the forest land and available industrial estate”.
He suggested that the private sector should use it more and more for their planning, and said that all important information regarding the National Master Plan is now available on the single platform.
“Due to which it will be possible to get project alignment and various types of clearances at the DPR (detailed project report) stage itself. This will also be helpful in reducing your (industry’s) compliance Burden,” he said, suggesting states to make PM Gati Shakti – National Master Plan base for their projects and economic zones. He added the logistic cost in India is considered to be 13-14 per cent of GDP and this is more than other countries.
The PM Gati Shakti has a huge role in improving infrastructure efficiency, he said adding that 24 digital systems of six ministries are being integrated through Unified Logistic Interface Platform (ULIP) and this will create a National Single Window Logistics Portal that will help in reducing the logistics cost.
“Our exports will also be greatly helped by PM Gati-Shakti and our MSMEs will be globally competitive,” he added. (PTI)
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