Jammu:The new Army Engineer-in-Chief (E-in-C), Lt. Gen. S.K. Shrivastava, who assumed office on the 1st of this month, today called on Union Minister of State (Independent Charge) of the Ministry of Development of North-Eastern Region (DoNER), MoS PMO, Personnel, Public Grievances & Pensions, Atomic Energy & Space, Dr Jitendra Singh and briefed him about the current status of the various Road and Bridge projects coming up in Jammu & Kashmir through various Army agencies including the Border Road Organization (BRO).
Gen. Shrivastava informed Dr Jitendra Singh that an important road project in district Kathua namely Parmanand-Taragarh-NJS-Parole has been fixed for completion this year and it also involves construction of three bridges including those on Begwal Nallah and Baknor Nallah. The timeline for completion of Chann-Khatriyan-Kattal-Gurjan-
E-in-C informed the Union Minister that the important Dhar-Udhampur road involves construction of a 259 meter span bridge at KM 42.59, which may take less than a year for completion, whereas the timeline for the entire road is 2019.
The BRO road construction from Kishtwar to Zanskar also came up for discussion. The E-in-C also informed about the upgradation of three bridges along Doda to Kishtwar road in order to make these capable of bearing the load of heavy equipment transport, as required by National Hydroelectric Power Corporation (NHPC).
Gen. Shrivastava updated Dr Jitendra Singh about the six crucial BRO bridges to come up this year in Kathua-Udhampur sector at a cost of over Rs.46 crore. One of these bridges, he said, has already become functional while the other five are likely to be completed by the end of this year. The Bein bridge is likely to be complete soon, while the Tarnah-II bridge is expected to be completed by the month of August this year, the Basantar bridge and the Tarnah-I bridge likely to be completed by October this year and the important Ujh bridge likely to be completed by November-December this year.
Dr Jitendra Singh stressed upon the E-in-C to expedite the pace of work on all these projects, so as to make sure that most of these projects are complete before the end of 2018. He also discussed the landmark Chhattergalla tunnel to be constructed at a budget of over Rs.3500 crore, the feasibility study of which has already been done and which will be taken up for construction in the course of the construction of the new National Highway from Lakhanpur to Basohli-Bani to Bhaderwah and Doda.