Arun Jaitley’s allocation was not enough. Road ministry is going to LIC for Rs 50,000 crore soft loan to achieve targets

Finance Minister Arun Jaitley allocated Rs 55, 000 crore to road ministry against the expectations of Rs 85, 000 crore and this has led the road transport and highways ministry to take up soft loan.

In a bid to continue with its plan of constructing and upgrading national highways, state highways the road ministry will seek a loan of more than Rs 50, 000 crore from the country's largest financial entity, Life Insurance Corporation of India (LIC).

Road transport minister Nitin Gadkari has already given his go ahead and the proposal will soon be taken up with LIC and finance ministry.
Road ministry plans to award road construction contracts for a little over 10,000 km of highway next financial year and also upgrade 50,000 km of state highways to national highways.

Meanwhile, with Jaitley’s Rs 55, 000 crore budgetary allocation, the roads ministry would be able to construct only 7,000 kilometres of highways.

The ministry has lined up 16 expressway projects out of which 10 worth Rs 40,000 crore have already received cabinet nod.

This is not the first time that LIC has been asked for soft loans.

Last year, Indian Railways had also sought a loan of Rs 1.5 lakh crore from the LIC to invest in its capacity expansion plan.

(Image: Indiatimes)