Not a single pothole on Mumbai-Pune Expressway in 27 years: Nitin Gadkari

Union road transport and highways minister Nitin Gadkari on Monday complained that he is blamed for road problems even when they are built by state governments.

Speaking at the Festival of Thinkers lecture series in Pune on Monday, Gadkari said that 27 years ago, he built the Mumbai-Pune Expressway and claimed it has not developed any potholes to date. But, he said, that has never been reported.

"I built the Mumbai-Pune Expressway 27 years ago. To this day, not a single pothole has appeared on it; the road remains in excellent condition, yet news about this never gets published," Gadkari told the gathering.

The union minister lamented that he gets blamed even when a road built by a state government caves in.

"During my tenure, the Forest Department did not grant permission, so I could not construct the 'missing link' road. The state government has now built that missing link road. When issues arose with it, I was targeted on social media, even though the project was executed by the Maharashtra government," Gadkari said.

What is the ‘missing link’ road?

The Mumbai-Pune Expressway Missing Link opened to traffic on May 1. It is a 13-km bypass that cuts through the Sahyadri mountains, features two twin tunnels and a cable-stayed bridge.

The road bypasses the winding Lonavala-Khandala ghat section and is designed to reduce the travel distance by 5.7 km and cut journey time between Mumbai and Pune by 20 to 30 minutes.

The road quality was called into question after a landslide triggered by incessant monsoon rains blocked the Pune-to-Mumbai carriageway, forcing authorities to close the route and divert traffic. The problem arose just nine weeks after the ₹6,695-crore project was inaugurated, triggering sharp criticism from the Opposition over the quality of construction.

Drawing a comparison with the construction of the Konkan Railway, Maharashtra chief minister Devendra Fadnavis rejected criticism of the 'Missing Link' project and said the government would implement additional safety measures suggested by experts while asserting that the engineering achievement should not be judged by a single incident.

NHAI denied the Lucknow-Kanpur Expressway cave-in

The National Highways Authority of India clarified in July that a viral claim about a section of the recently inaugurated Lucknow-Kanpur Greenfield Elevated Expressway caving in was incorrect, saying that only the road's upper surface was affected and was repaired within hours.

This came as a video purportedly showing a damaged portion of the expressway in Unnao's Korari area surfaced on social media.

NHAI Project Director Nakul Prakash Verma told PTI that only the upper surface was affected over a stretch of about 40 metres, and "it cannot be termed as a road cave-in." He explained that a cave-in means the soil beneath settles and the entire road sinks.

"Here, there was only slippage in the upper wearing coat," Verma said, adding that repair work was completed before 5 pm on Sunday and traffic was moving normally on the expressway.

Responding to questions over construction quality, Verma said such technical issues could occasionally arise on long stretches of asphalt roads.

Verma also said there was no proposal at present for any separate inquiry into the incident, describing it as a routine technical issue that was rectified immediately.