Majority of Assam's National Highways Remain Two-Lane or Narrower

Staff Reporter

Guwahati: Many new national highway (NH) projects are in the pipeline in Assam, but more than 50% of the existing NHs, in terms of length, are still two-lane ones or less.

According to available information, the NHs in the state comprise a length of 4,077 km. Of this, 2,947 km of NHs are of two lanes or less.

Currently, only 20 km of NH are more than four-lane. The Guwahati Bypass was recently upgraded by the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) to a six-lane one. As of today, this is the only stretch of NH in the state that is of six-lane configuration.

There is a total of 1,110 km of four-lane NHs in the state. A total length of 2,541 km of NHs in the state is still of two lanes, which is the highest among the NHs. Surprisingly, there exist 406 km of NHs that are of less than two-lane configuration.

Recently, NHAI has awarded the construction work on the proposed Guwahati Ring Road project to a Gujarat-based construction firm. One of the stretches of the Guwahati Ring Road project is the greenfield Northern Guwahati Bypass from Baihata Chariali of Kamrup district to Sonapur of Kamrup (Metro) district via Kuruwa and Chandrapur, comprising a length of 55.54 km. This portion of the road will be a four-lane one. However, the 3-km bridge over the Brahmaputra River connecting Kuruwa on the north bank and Narengi on the south bank that is part of this stretch will be of six-lane configuration.  

With the double-engine government of the BJP in place in both New Delhi and Dispur, the thrust should now be on converting the NHs of two lanes or less in the state to at least four-lane ones, keeping in mind the increasing volume of traffic on the NHs, which is growing rapidly day by day.

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