Aimed at providing pucca roads to villages having a population of less than 500 inhabitants, the Ministry of Rural Development has decided to revise the existing norms of Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana (PMGSY).
According to the proposal, the government wants to merge PMGSY, a centrally sponsored rural road scheme, with Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Scheme to build all-weather motorable roads.
Under the revised scheme, priority will be given to construction of roads in hilly and Left-wing extremist-hit areas. The Centre wants to complete the task of building roads under the revised project by 2019, said an official in the ministry. With the government getting requests from the states, the Centre decided to revise the scheme to provide all-weather road connectivity to small villages also, the official said.
Under PMGSY, which was launched in 2000 by the NDA government headed by Atal Bihari Vajpayee, more than 4.81-lakh km of roads connecting 1.92 lakh habitations across the country were conducted till June 30.
Since the inception of the scheme, the rural development ministry has released Rs 1.39-lakh crore and states have reported an expenditure of Rs 1.5-lakh crore till June 30, Minister of State for Rural Development Ram Kripal Yadav informed the Lok Sabha recently.
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