An amount Rs 400 crore for land compensation has been deposited with the deputy commissioner of East Khasi Hills district and West Khasi Hills district, which will be paid to landowners who had parted their land for the Shillong-Tamabil road expansion.
The National Highways and Infrastructure Development Corporation Limited (NHICDL) had invited tender in four packages for the widening of the national highway-40 from Shillong to Tamabil that links Meghalaya with neighbouring Bangladesh.
The road project is being funded by the Japanese International Cooperation Agency (JICA) at Rs 1,251 crore.
Meghalaya deputy chief minister in-charge PWD (Roads), Prestone Tynsong said that the NHIDCL has invited the tender in four packages and each package of the tender will cost not less than Rs 120 crore.
Tynsong said that construction of the road project would soon within a year.
The NH-40 will be converted into four-lane for 15 km from Umshyrpi bridge in Shillong to 7th Miles, Upper Shillong.
The project has to be completed in two and a half years from the date of allotment of work.
The widening includes the construction of a new bridge over Umngot river at Dawki.
A new bridge at Dawki has to be built as an existing single-lane 136-metre suspension bridge is old and unable to support heavy vehicles with loads.
The new bridge at Dawki will be of 368 metres length and 12.5 metres width, and it will be built upward of the existing bridge.
An old bridge at Dawki was built by the British since 1932 as an overland link between the then provinces of East Bengal and Assam.
