Cabinet approves Dwarka Road Tunnel Corridor (6-lane) on NH-148AE under NH(O) Scheme
Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) approved an 8.1-km, 6-lane Dwarka Road Tunnel corridor on NH-148AE under the NH(O) Scheme, to be built by NHAI at an estimated cost of ₹6,969.67 crore.
- Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs approval is a step before major highway projects start execution by implementing agencies like NHAI.
- NH(O) Scheme is the highway programme category; Hybrid Annuity Mode (HAM) mixes government annuity support with private concessionaire financing and contract risk-sharing.
- Access-controlled road links reduce entry/exit points, which helps reduce conflict and improve travel reliability for through traffic.
- The Dwarka Tunnel Corridor is expected to reduce reliance on congested airport-linked routes like Dhaula Kuan–IGI Airport–Mahipalpur, Chhatarpur–Mahipalpur and Rangpuri.
What happened (decision, scope, and route connectivity)
The Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs (CCEA) approved the Dwarka Road Tunnel corridor (6-lane) on NH-148AE. The approved project is an 8.1-km, six-lane corridor with a key civil-structure component: a 3.14-km twin-tube tunnel, including 1.98 km beneath the Southern Ridge.
NHAI (National Highways Authority of India) under the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways (MoRTH) is the implementing agency. The corridor is planned to connect Shiv Murti Interchange on Dwarka Expressway (NH-248BB) with Nelson Mandela Marg in Vasant Kunj.
UPSC may treat the Dwarka Road Tunnel corridor as a case of planned urban road connectivity being delivered through a national infrastructure financing model (NH(O) on HAM), with expected impacts on travel time, airport access, and east–west movement across Delhi–Gurugram links.
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