Garhwal Post Bureau
Dehradun, 9 Jun: Prime Minister Narendra Modi today completed 12 years in office. His tenure has been highly eventful on the domestic as well as international fronts. For Uttarakhand too, the Modi era has been highly productive. Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami commented today that the twelve years of Narendra Modi’s tenure as Prime Minister will be remembered in golden letters for Uttarakhand’s development, with unprecedented expansion in road, rail and air connectivity. He noted that under Modi’s leadership, and with the double‑engine momentum provided by the state government, the pace of infrastructure growth has been historic, making it possible to reach major cities from any part of the state within a few hours.
The Char Dham all‑weather road project, launched in December 2016 with an estimated cost of Rs 12,000 crores, has seen nearly 90 per cent of its work completed, greatly easing travel across the hill regions and to the four shrines. Another milestone has been the Delhi–Dehradun Economic Corridor, built at a cost of Rs 11,963 crores over 210 kilometres, which has reduced travel time between the two cities to just two and a half hours. Several other projects, including the Sitarganj–Tanakpur, Paonta Sahib–Dehradun, Bhaniyawala–Rishikesh, Kathgodam–Lalkuan–Haldwani bypass and Rudrapur bypass, are also progressing with central support.
Besides this, air connectivity has expanded significantly, with the extension of Jolly Grant, Pantnagar and Pithoragarh airports. Under the Udaan scheme, 18 heliports are being developed, of which 12 are already operational. Regular flights now connect Dehradun to Ahmedabad, Bhubaneswar, Bengaluru, Mumbai, Kolkata, Delhi, Jaipur, Lucknow, Pune and Kullu. In addition, the Mukhyamantri Udan Khatola Yojana is providing heli services from Dehradun and Haldwani to remote hill districts, ensuring access to air travel even in far‑flung areas.
The government has also asserted that, in the past 12 years, train services have also advanced rapidly, with more than 72 per cent of work completed on the 125‑kilometre Rishikesh–Karnaprayag line. Surveys for the Tanakpur–Bageshwar and Doiwala–Gangotri–Yamunotri Railway lines have been approved, while eleven railway stations in the state are being modernised under the Amrit Bharat Station scheme.
Dhami noted that the Modi era has given Uttarakhand a new identity in connectivity, with road, rail and air services reaching unprecedented levels. This transformation has laid a strong foundation for the state’s future development and will be remembered as a golden chapter in Uttarakhand’s progress.
