The proposal to build two tunnels, Singhpora-Vailoo and Sudhmahadev-Dranga — on the Anantnag-Chenani corridor in Jammu-Kashmir has halted. Multiple reasons were presented by the expenditure secretary-headed Public Investment Board (PIB) after turning down the recommendation for this construction. There was an estimated cost of nearly Rs 9,000 crore of building both the tunnels.
Furthermore, an existing road already connects the origin and destination of the proposed tunnel. Officials of the National Highway and Infrastructure Development Corporations Ltd (NHIDCL) informed that these roads did not fall under strategic roads of the defence ministry in the meeting on March.
The PIB has also taken up projects by the NHIDCL in the past and recorded that the agency had not provided traffic details on the existing and proposed road between the origin and destination. As per TOI, the inter-ministerial panel has appraised all public-funded projects before these however, no source of direct benefit from these two projects have been found.
Pointing at the existing conduit, the PIB mentioned that it is good quality and functional. The J&K double tunnel project is likely to be delayed until further notice as per the direction of the road transport ministry. They instructed that no fresh project would be approved under Bharatmala and that all highway works costing more than Rs 1,000 require a Cabinet approval by mandate.
Falling under this category, the two tunnel project in Jammu-Kashmir failed to receive appraisal from PIB and Public Private Partnership(PPP) Appraisal Committee and thus dropped on account of budget and existing infrastructure.