Purvanchal Expressway progress: Uttar Pradesh chief minister Yogi Adityanath recently reviewed the progress of phase-III of Purvanchal Expressway. The Purvanchal Expressway, said to be one of the longest in India, is likely to be ready by November and the government expects it to be functional from Diwali this year. The deadline for completion was 2021, however, according to a recent tweet, UP CM is confident that the construction shall be finished within this year itself. Starting from Chand Sarai in District Lucknow, the highway will end at Haidaria in Ghazipur district.
The Purvanchal Expressway project was started in December 2016 and was launched by then Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh, Akhilesh Yadav. Later, the project was continued with some changes in alignment and acquisition of complete land for the Purvanchal Expressway. The highway will be linked with Varanasi as well through a different link road. Moreover, the project is likely to connect nine districts in Uttar Pradesh including Ghazipur, Lucknow, Azamagarh, Faizabad, Amethi, Ambedkarnagar, Sultanpur, Barabanki and Mau.
The 340 km Purvanchal Expressway has an estimated cost of Rs 22,000 crore which includes land acquisition cost. The Purvanchal Expressway will also be connected to Delhi indirectly via 165 km long Yamuna Expressway that passes through Agra-Greater Noida. It will also be linked to Agra-Lucknow Expressway which is 302 km long.
Meanwhile, the Uttar Pradesh Expressway Industrial Development Authority (UPEIDA) is reportedly planning to launch a mobile app which will help the authority monitor all the construction works. The mobile app is also expected to enable the common people know about all the construction and the accessibility of the expressway that will be passing through all the nine districts of the state. UPEIDA chief Awanish Awasthi was quoted in an HT report saying that till February 1, majority of grubbing and clearing work has been completed along with the completion of 70 per cent soil work.
