INFRA

Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Tuesday (December 29, 2020) inaugurated the New Bhaupur-New Khurja section and the Operation Control Centre of Eastern Dedicated Freight Corridor and said that infrastructure development should be kept above politics.

During his video conference address, PM Narendra Modi said, "The development of the country's infrastructure should be kept away from politics. Country's infrastructure should be a mission to benefit many generations, not 5 years of politics. If political parties have to compete, there should be competition in the quality of infrastructure, competition on speed and scale." 

PM Modi said that infrastructure is the biggest source of any nation's strength.

India’s infra sector to get a boost! The Viability Gap Funding (VGF) scheme has been notified by the Finance Ministry under which infrastructure projects would be selected for financial support. As per the VGF scheme notified by the Finance Ministry, the Empowered Committee (EC) headed by the economic affairs secretary will sanction funding up to an amount of Rs 200 crore, while projects requiring over Rs 200 crore would be approved by the Empowered Committee with Finance Minister’s approval, according to a news agency report. The other members of the Empowered Committee would be CEO of NITI Aayog, expenditure secretary, line ministry’s secretary dealing with the subject as well as joint secretary in the Department of Economic Affairs as member secretary.

Over 70 years have elapsed since the country gained Independence but residents of Khemkaran border area are still waiting for civic amenities. Their area still cries for proper road connectivity. The condition of link roads in the area always remains in bad shape. Besides, the condition of the 50-km-long Khemkaran-Amritsar National Highway is also deplorable, adding to the residents’ worries.

Earlier, it was known as the Khemkaran-Amritsar state highway. Eight years ago, the highway was upgraded as the national highway with its width being increased from 22 feet to 33 feet. This highway project is still far from completion. The road has become a lifeline for border area residents. Thousands of residents travel daily from the area to Amritsar and vice-versa. These include students, employees, farmers, traders, etc.

Sahib Singh, a resident of the area, said people welcomed the project of the national highway as the road has been given divider facility which was to make the highway an accident-free zone. He said the part of the highway from Bhikhiwind to Khemkaran, which has been completed, was neither properly designed nor built as sewerage water of villages could be seen accumulated in the Bhikhiwind, Amarkot and Cheema parts of the highway.

he NIIF was set up in December 2015 as a Category-II Alternate Investment Fund. NIIF chief executive Sujoy Bose, however, was appointed in only June 2016 and the senior management of the fund was also put in place by early 2017.

After a slow start, fund-raising by the National Investment and Infrastructure Fund (NIIF) has gained some momentum of late. However, close to five years after its inception, the quasi-sovereign wealth fund is yet to develop into a large enough financing vehicle to be able to meaningfully anchor the government’s ambitious investment plans under the Rs 111-lakh-crore National Infrastructure Pipeline (NIP).

In a world drastically changed by COVID-19, the Indian real estate industry must move on, rebuild, reinvent and reimagine its future. Thanks to a microscopic virus, the world has become more connected, but the business landscape ahead is opaque and uncertain at best. Across industries, research teams have had to change gears quickly to help industries navigate this strange new world. Data-led research is no longer just an option - it has become a core necessity.

 The lockdown period itself saw a scramble for informed insights into how the real estate would behave in the months - and perhaps years - ahead. More than raw data, the requirement now is for research-based conclusions, predictions and advice. Across the real estate value chain from developers to banking institutions and from government agencies to private equity players, industry stakeholders are investing heavily in such research.

 Their prime focus areas - how to navigate a marketplace which will no longer behave as accustomed, and how to harvest a new and potentially fertile field of opportunity.