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“Ministry of Road Transport & Highways have taken up development of Delhi Amritsar Katra Expressway under Bharatmala praiyojana. The alignment of expressway was firmed up in January, 2019 and process of land acquisition has been initiated. Recently, the issue of alignment of Expressway to Amritsar has been taken up by Harsimrat Kaur Badal, Minister of Food Processing Industries and Hardeep Singh Puri, Minister of State (I/C) Civil Aviation, Housing & Urban Affairs with Nitin Gadkari, Hon’ble Minister Roads Transport & Highways. The issue has also been raised by Shwait Malik, MP (Rajya Sabha), Gurjit Singh Aujla, MP (Lok Sabha), Govt. of Punjab, Sikh organisations and other public representatives.”
“It may be pointed out that Govt. of J&K had initially proposed Delhi-Katra Expressway. However, Hon’ble Minister (RT&H) envisaged that the proposed expressway would pass through Amritsar looking at religious importance of the city where over four million tourists visit every year and hence conceived Delhi-Amrtsar-Katra Expressway under Bharatmala.”
“In order to discuss and resolve issue of alignment to Amritsar, VC meeting was held under Chairmanship of Gadkari which was attended by Captain Amrinder Singh, Chief Minister, Punjab, Harsimrat Kaur Badal, Hardeep Singh Puri, Dr. Jitender Singh, MoS (IC) MoDoNER, Gen V. K. Singh, MoS (RT&H), Shwait Malik, Gurjeet Singh Aujala, and Anil Joshi, Ex Cabinet Minister, Govt. of Punjab. Secretary MoRT&H, Chairman NHAI and other senior officers were also present in the meeting.”
“At the outset, it is reiterated that Amritsar city was always an integral part of the Delhi-Amritsar-Katra Expressway. From beginning Expressway was proposed as combination of Greenfield and Brownfield alignment in two phases. After detailed deliberations, considering the concerns raised by the above mentioned dignitaries and public representatives as well as sentiments of people of Punjab, Gadkari has decided for development of Greenfield new connectivity to Amritsar City from Nakodar via Sultanpur lodhi, Goindwal Sahib, Khadoor Sahib as part of Delhi-Amritsar Expressway. Further, the Road from Amritsar to Gurdaspur would also be fully developed and made completely signal free. With this, traffic would have option to travel to Gurdaspur onwards from Nakodar i.e. via Amritsar or via Kartarpur.”
“This greenfield alignment will not only provide shortest and alternate express connectivity to Amritsar city but also to other religious centres of Sultanpur Lodhi, Goindwal Sahib, Khadur Sahib as well as the recently developed Dera Baba Nanak/Kartarpur Sahib International Corridor in Punjab.”
