Tuesday, May 20, 2008

Mega Plan for Industrial Corridor in Andhra Pradesh

Deccan Chronicle -Kakinada, May 19: The government plans to spent Rs 20,000 crore to develop ‘linkages’ for the industrial corridor between Kakinada and Visakhapatnam. These include roads, railways, airports, ports and other external infrastructure.


The proposal has got the nod of the Centre a few days ago. Under this project, a 138 km-long coastal corridor will be built between Kakinada Port and Gangavaram Port (near Vizag) with six-lane roads and pipeline corridor at a cost of Rs 1,062 crore. In the subsequent phases the link road will be converted into an eight-lane road by spending Rs 875 crore.

As part of the programme, the present Asian Development Bank-sponsored road will be converted as a four-lane road between Kathipudi and Kakinada Port in an extent of 51.07 km. In addition to this, the National Highway 214 will be developed into four-lane road from the present two-lane at a cost of Rs 260 crore.

Later, it will be developed into a six-lane road at a cost of Rs 387 crore.As part of the industrial corridor development, the existing NH 5 will be developed into six-lane road for 190 km between Rajahmundry and Visakhapatnam.

In addition to this, the other external road links will be provided with Rs 512 crore. In all, Rs
4,021 crore will be spent on the road development activity as part of Industrial corridor project. For the development of rail links Rs 1,010 crore will be spend in the corridor. A rail link of 26 km will be taken up at a cost of Rs 102 crore between APSEZ and Gangavaram.For the provision of rail freight stations and for Gangavaram Port logistics Rs 730 crore will be utilised.

Further, authorities are allocating Rs 2,640 crore for developing airports in the region. This would include the development of the new Visakhapatnam International Airport with Rs 2,000 crore and the upgradation of Rajahmundry airport at Rs 120 crore. These proposals were discussed at a meet held recently by the Infrastructure Development Corporation of Andhra Pradesh with allied departments.

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AP looking at integrating infrastructure development

Hyderabad, May 19, 2008: The Andhra Pradesh Government is looking at integrating infrastructure development for the proposed Costal Corridor and the Petroleum, Chemicals and Petrochemical Investment Region (PCPIR) projects.

“Since the first phase of the proposed Costal Corridor will be from Visakhapatnam to Kakinada, where the PCPIR project is slated to come up, the State Government is looking at developing work relating to basic infrastructure simultaneously,” Mr Sanjay Jaju, Vice-Chairman and Managing Director of Infrastructure Corporation of Andhra Pradesh (INCAP), told Business Line here today.

Mr Jaju also said that International Finance Corporation (IFC), an arm of the World Bank, will implement the road projects in the area. He added that they got a feel of what the development in the area will look like once the project is implemented.

PCPIR project

A Government official also said that a meeting of the committee of Union Secretaries is slated for May 21 in New Delhi, to take a final decision on the PCPIR project which would in turn be recommended to the Cabinet for the final approval within the next one month.

Andhra Pradesh has turned out to be one of the prime contenders for the proposed PCPIR being envisaged by the Central Government.

The project in Andhra Pradesh is estimated to attract investments to the tune of around Rs 3 lakh crore and as per current estimates the State has more than half of the total investment envisaged for the project.

“IDFC is the consultant for the Chennai-Bangalore-Mumbai industrial corridor and we have had a meeting with them so that our proposal can be studied,” he said referring to the State proposal to join the project.

Initial plan

According to initial plan, the State Government is proposing development stretch from Satyavedu to Chennai and also development of Nellore to Bangalore region covering Rajampet, Kadapa, Ananthapur and Hindupur.

As per Government estimates, the total corridor in Andhra Pradesh is likely to cover 300 km.

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