Karnataka govt kickstarts PRR project

The Karnataka Cabinet on Wednesday decided to start the process of acquiring land for the Peripheral Ring Road (PRR) in Bengaluru by making some tweaks that the government hopes will kickstart the long-pending project that promises to decongest the capital.

The decade-old project will connect four highways - Tumakuru Road, Ballari Road, Old Madras Road, and Hosur road - to create seamless connectivity with Kanakapura Road and Mysuru Road, two other major highways connecting to Tamil Nadu and Kerala.

A total of 1,810 acres of land spread across 67 villages or settlements have been marked for acquisition. “Landowners who will lose below two acres will be compensated based on the 2013 land acquisition law. Those losing more than two acres will get 50% cash and 50% of the transfer of development rights (TDR),” Deputy Chief Minister CN Ashwath Narayan said, briefing reporters after the Cabinet meeting.

This compensation approach has been decided after considering directions issued by courts based on petitions filed by land losers. “The cost of land acquisition is estimated to be Rs 8,100 crore whereas road construction is pegged at Rs 3,850 crore,” Narayan said. “The government will bear the land acquisition cost by way of a loan to a special purpose vehicle. For road formation, we will get a loan from the Japan International Cooperation Agency.”

The proposed PRR will be built with a 100m width as against the earlier plan of making it 75m wide. “Keeping in mind the need for a service road and cycle tracks, the width of the road will be 100m. Earlier, 25m was kept for commercial development, which we have removed,” Narayan said.

According to Narayan, the government will need one year to complete the land acquisition process and three years to construct the road. “All the nitty-gritty has been figured out.”

Law Minister JC Madhuswamy added that tenders for road construction will be floated once 80% of the land acquisition is done “in order to disallow escalation of costs.”