Khyber Pakhtunkhwa Highway Council (KPHC) Sunday approved the Provincialisation of six different roads and approved a budget of Rs 4.693 billion of Pakhtunkhwa Highway Authority (PkHA) for financial year 2019-20 along with approving proposed maintenance plan for the year worth Rs 2.032 billion.
The meeting held at Chief Minister House Peshawar was attended by Minister for C&W Akbar Ayub, Minister for Agriculture & Livestock Mohibullah, Additional Chief Secretary Shehzad Bangash, administrative secretaries of Finance and C&W, Managing Director (MD) Pakhtunkhwa Highway Authority and other concerned authorities.
Presiding over the meeting, the Chief Minister stressed the need for timely and quality completion of proposed projects to improve infrastructure in the province. He particularly directed that main and eventful roads of newly merged districts and other backward areas should be focused in this respect. Improvement of communication network in the province as per desired standard should be the ultimate goal that will not only provide better transportation facilities to the public but would also be helpful for promoting tourism and restoring industries and investment as well.
The meeting was informed about the implementation status on the decisions taken in the previous meeting of the council and briefed in details about the new ADP schemes for 2019-20, budget and maintenance plan of Highways Authority. In the meeting, provincialization of six different roads was approved that included 20-Kilometer Baryam to Gat road, 17-Kilometer Khadagzai bridge to Chakdara road, 8.50-Kilometer Fatehpur to Miadam road, 29-Kilometer Oghi-Battagram road, 55-Kilometer Mardan-Katlang-Buner road and 10-Kilometer Rahatkot to Sakhra road.
The meeting also approved change of name of Chappar Road to Shahrah-e-Tanawal and naming provincial highway eastern, western and northern bypass as Mardan Ring Road. Purchase of snow clearance machinery for Barrian- Nathiagali-Abbottabad and Manglawar-Malam Jabba roads costing Rs 180 million was also approved in the meeting.
The average expected income from sourcing out of these machines would be Rs 8.025 million. Moreover, the meeting approved floating of snow clearance/ land sliding bids in the month of September every year in order to ensure clearance of road in time because as per standard procedure, PkHA starts the process of procurement after the approval of the council but the meeting is mostly convened after September which causes delay in procurement process.
The Chief Minister directed the Authority that snow clearance is a routine job that should not be delayed for meeting of the council. On this occasion, imposition of toll tax on four different provincial highways at the proposed locations was also approved that expected to earn a revenue of Rs 29.01 million. However, the Chief Minister directed that on the proposed four provincial highways toll tax should be imposed on commercial vehicles only and non commercial vehicles would be exempted in this regard.
Copyright Business Recorder, 2019
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