Dwarka expressway: Parts of Delhi leg to open in February

Work on at a portion of the expressway on January 9.

The Delhi leg of the Dwarka expressway is around 80% complete and stretches of the facility could be opened as early as February, the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) officials and the contractor employed for the project have said.

The project as a whole, however, will only be ready by August, they said.

The Dwarka expressway, a ₹9,000 crore project between Dwarka in Delhi and Kherki Daula in Gurugram, is being built in four packages — the first two are in Delhi (Shiv Murti to Bijwasan, and Bijwasan to Haryana border), while packages three and four are in Gurugram (Haryana border to Basai, and Basai to Cloverleaf near Kherki Daula).

Last week, the Gurugram administration announced that packages three and four — the Gurugram leg of the expressway — are likely to open for traffic by the end of February.

Along the same vein, officials have now said that stretches in the Delhi leg are likely to be ready by February.

“Work on the first package is 80% done. A major eight-lane tunnel starting from Samalkha (along NH-48) that reaches Mahipalpur has been completed. All civil work is completed, and electrical and mechanical work is going on in this tunnel… In package two, two major flyovers and an interchange near Bharthal have been completed… We are planning to make some portions of packages one and two operational by the end of February,” said a senior official of the highway contractor.

A senior NHAI official, on condition of anonymity, said major structures of package one and two have been completed. “The flyover and other interconnecting structures and tunnels at Urban Extension Road (UER) 2 and Bharthal are near completion,” he said, adding that the stack interchange along NH-48 and a tunnel between the Indira Gandhi International airport and Samalkha are close to completion.

HT reached out to NHAI regional officer Mohammad Safi, but he did not comment on the matter.

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