Uttar Pradesh chief minister Yogi Adityanath has set his eyes on the dream project – Ganga Expressway – from Meerut to Prayagraj. The length will be around 630 kilometres. The cost of it would be Rs 36,000 crore. 

This comes in the wake of the rapid progress of the Purvanchal and Bundelkhand expressways.

The foundation-stone laying ceremony will, in all likelihood, take place in June 2021. 

The chief minister has instructed officials to complete all due processes – including land acquisition – by then. 

Reports add that the chief minister has asked officials to work zealously to ensure the project sees the light of day by the timeframe mentioned. 

Out of the total outlay, around Rs 9255 crore will be spent towards the acquisition of land while Rs 22,145 crore will go to civil works.

A popular website added that the proposed Ganga expressway will cover 12 districts including Meerut, Bulandshahr, Hapur, Amroha, Sambhal, Badaun, Shahjahanpur, Hardoi, Unnao, Rae Bareli, Pratapgarh, and Prayagraj.

Once completed and opened for use, the expressway will become the state’s longest, six-lane (expandable to eight lanes) expressway connecting western UP with eastern UP. The expressway will also drastically bring down the time taken to travel between the Meerut and Prayagraj. The design speed of the expressway will be 120 kmph whereas travelling speed will be 100 kmph.

Once completed, the total network of expressways in Uttar Pradesh will be 1,900 km.

Additional Chief Secretary (Home) and UP Expressway Development Authority CEO A Awasthi described the project as “one of the biggest challenges” for the state government given its scale.

As quoted by the website, Awasthi said, “In Phase-2 of this project, chief minister Yogi Adityanath wants us to take the Ganga Expressway up to Haridwar and Varanasi which will make its length over 1,000 km.”

This network of expressways will open the entire UP to Delhi and benefit Bihar as well.

“We have seen that people prefer to move by road from Delhi to Lucknow through the Agra-Lucknow Expressway than by air. There is a jump in traffic on the Agra-Lucknow Expressway after the ‘unlock’ happened, as people now prefer their own transport,” Awasthi said.