Devotes visiting Haridwar may soon use ropeway to travel between Har Ki Pauri and Chandi Devi Temple, the two important religious places in the holy City.

The Uttarakhand Metro Rail, Urban Infrastructure and Building Construction Corporation Ltd (UKMRC), last week invited bids from private parties to build, maintain and operate a ropeway project from Har Ki Pauri to Chandi Devi Mandir at Haridwar.

The “Har Ki Pauri – Chandi Devi Ropeway” shall be approximately 2.3 km in length and will be developed with an investment of Rs 160.80 crore.

The ropeway will start near the Deen Dayal parking area and upper endpoint will be near Chandi Devi Temple, at the junction of pedestrian path way to Chandi Devi and Pathway to Anjana Mata Mandir.

The ropeway will have a minimum capacity to carry 1,800 passengers per hour per direction (PPHPD) with a total operation time of 16 hours per day. However, if concessionaire wants to install higher capacity ropeway, then he may do so.

The concessionaire shall construct the ropeway project in 730 days and will have the exclusive right, to operate and maintain the Project for a period of 30 years.

Necessity

Being one of the seven holiest cities in India, Haridwar often bustles with devotees. Its propitious location near the holy River Ganga has made it to gain more popularity.

Haridwar is also one of the four places where Kumbh Mela occurs after rotation of every twelve years and Ardh Kumbh Mela is organised after six years of every Kumbh.

The proposed ropeway will provide world class connectivity to Chandi Devi Temple — a Hindu temple dedicated to Goddess Chandi Devi and situated atop the Neel Parvat on the eastern summit of the Shivalik Hills, the southernmost mountain chain of the Himalayas.

The project once complete will allow devotees to reach Chandi devi Mandir in eight minutes from Har ki Pauri which is a major and popular ghat on the banks of Ganga river in Haridwar.

The dedicated personal rapid transit system will not only make the journey comfortable and time saving, but it will also be eco-friendly and energy efficient.

Gujarat government has started preliminary work on a peripheral road project that will be running along its borders with other states and its coastline, as reported by Times of India.

The 3,533-km project known as the ‘Parikrama Path project’ is estimated to cost Rs 2,000 crore and will fill in missing linkages between national and state highways along the state’s borders.

“Parikrama Path has been planned in a way that by using existing national highways and state highways, and by constructing additional roads and bridges, a large ring road will be set up. Under this scheme, 40 per cent of the distance involved is national highways, 33 per cent state highways and 27 per cent is other roads and missing links,” a draft of the project states.

“The missing linkages will be added in a phased manner. We expect to complete the project in two years. Once completed, it will cover important growth centres and help boost connectivity and accessibility,” noted the report.

Three Corridors

According to the project blueprint, the mega-ring road will be divided into three different corridors.

The first corridor, also called the eastern corridor, will link the eastern belt roads with the Statue of Unity – Saputara link road and pass through various cities like Modasa, Dahod, and Vapi.

The second corridor will stretch across South Gujarat coastline through Saurashtra and Kutch and will pass through cities such as Valsad, Bharuch, Dholera, Una, Somnath, Porbandar, Dwarka and Jamnagar.

The last corridor will run along the international border in Kutch bringing the northern periphery of the state. The 310-km international border divides the Kutch region of Gujarat and the Sindh province of Pakistan.

Significance

Besides linking important tourist and pilgrimage centres, the project will also enable seamless connectivity for traffic coming from the neighbouring states. It will also add value to the state’s logistics network as the coastline is dotted by several ports.

At about 1,214 km, Gujarat on the west coast has the longest coastline amongst the Indian states. Covering 16 coastal districts, the coastline has huge diversity of marine based ecosystems and development opportunities.

Further, the road network will mainstream the tribal areas on the eastern side of the state. As per the 2011 census, tribal population in Gujarat was 89.17 lakh, around 15 per cent of its total population. The members of the community are largely spread across 14 eastern districts of the state. The tribal population is concentrated in 48 talukas.