Union Minister of Road Transport & Highways and Shipping Nitin Gadkari launched Green Highways (Plantation, Transplantation, Beautification and Maintenance) Policy, 2015. The policy that seeks to promote green covers along National Highway corridors was launched at the National Conference in New Delhi. The aim of the policy is to promote greening of Highway corridors with participation of the community, farmers, private sector, NGOs, and government institutions.

Points to Note

• Under this policy, the government has made it mandatory to set aside 1 per cent of the total project cost of any highways contract to a “Green Fund” corpus for plantation.
• The scheme would provide employment to at least 5 lakh youth. The policy will also help in cutting down the carbon footprints and hugely benefit the environment.
• “The Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) and Airports Authority of India’s GPS Aided Geo Augmented Navigation — GAGAN and BHUVAN would be used to map the plants.
• The policy calls for creation of fund account called Green Highways Fund (GHF) for developing green covers along the NH corridors.
• The GHF will be created from the fund collected through 1 percent of the TPC contributed by the developers.
• All expressways and access-controlled highways including Delhi-Katra would be built as green highways.
• The government may extend this Green Policy to Prime Minister Gramin Vikas Yojana and other schemes to realise the dream of ‘Clean India and Green India’.

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The Shortest National Highway of India is