Govt surpasses target for village roads

The government has exceeded its target of laying roads under the Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojna (PMGSY) in the last two financial years, the Rajya Sabha was informed today.

In 2010-11, the government constructed 45,108.53 kms of roads against its target of 34,090 kms, while in 2009-10, 60,116.99 kms of roads were built surpassing the target of 55,000 kms, Minister of State for Rural Development Pradeep Jain 'Aditya' said.

However, in 2008-09, only 52,404.52 kms of roads were constructed whereas the target was to build 64,440 kms of paved roads.

Replying to another query on number of villages connected under the PMGSY in the last three years, the Minister said out of the targeted 35,100 villages, only 29,934 were connected with such roads.

"Major reasons for shortfall in achievement of targets are: limited institutional and contracting capacity in states, non-availability of land and forest clearance and unfavourable weather conditions," Jain said.

On steps taken by the Ministry to improve its performance, he said the states have been requested to augment executing capacity, and bidding document provisions have been rationalised.

"Training is being imparted to field engineers for capacity building and regular and structured review is conducted to monitor physical and financial progress," he said.