The Caretaker Federal Government terminated the Sukkur-Hyderabad M6 Motorway contract with the National Highway Authority (NHA) and the Special Investment and Facilitation Council (ACC) and other agencies, increasing the cost of the project substantially. done.
Now there will be a new plan for the construction of the Motorway and its cost will also increase and the construction of Sukkur-Hyderabad Motorway will be further delayed due to the poor economic conditions of the country.
According to a Dawn newspaper report , the joint venture of Techno, ACC and CMC had invested more than Rs 300 billion in the project using their own funds. 9.5 billion in gap funding was requested.
Interestingly, after recently terminating the contract, the National Highway Authority has provided a revised cost estimate for the project totaling Rs 400 billion, excluding viability gap funding, from the Special Investment and Facilitation Council. Said to attract local and foreign investors for this project.
“We have terminated the contract and provided a revised estimate of over Rs 400 billion to the Special Investment and Facilitation Council,” a National Highway Authority spokesperson said.
The spokesperson did not mention that the revised cost does not include the viability gap funding of Rs 300 billion to Rs 400 billion provided by the National Highway Authority.
M6 Motorway is the main motorway network between Peshawar and Karachi which is still incomplete.
By terminating the contract, the National Highway Authority has opened up the possibility of an unsustainable loss of over Rs 300-400 billion to the national exchequer in case of cost escalation, a retired official of the National Highway Authority said on condition of anonymity. have given
He further said that the cost of the project will increase to Rs 700 billion, out of which the National Highway Authority will have to provide a viability gap funding share of around Rs 300 billion.
He said that the cancellation of the agreement has dealt a big blow to the efforts of the Special Investment and Facilitation Council as the huge investment of more than 300 billion rupees which was coming from a local investor has not only stopped but the investors The trust has also been hurt.
It should be noted that Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif laid the foundation stone of Hyderabad to Sukkur Motorway in Sukkur on 13 December 2022.
Spokesperson NHA said at the event that the 306 km long Hyderabad-Sukkur Motorway M6 will be completed in 30 months on the basis of public-private partnership.
He said that the project will cost more than 307 billion rupees. It will have 15 interchanges, a big bridge over the Indus River, 19 underpasses, 6 flyovers.
According to NHA, 10 service areas will be constructed on both sides of the motorway at a distance of 50 km. The motorway will go from Sukkur to Hyderabad passing through Khairpur, Nowshahroferoz, Benazirabad, Matiari, Jamshoro.
Later, a corruption scandal of billions of rupees was revealed in the same project.
According to the police investigation of the scandal, for the M6 motorway project, the National Highway Authority released funds of more than Rs. But the rules and regulations were not taken care of.
Deputy Commissioner Nowshahrofiroz Tashfeen Alam, who received more than 3 billion 61 crore rupees, fled to Azerbaijan on a foreign flight.
On the other hand, under the supervision of Deputy Commissioner Matiari, who received more than 4 billion rupees, cash of 2 billion rupees was allegedly withdrawn, but the land was allegedly not purchased.
The Sindh government had formed a committee to investigate the alleged corruption and Anti-Corruption Sindh had also registered cases.
