IJM Awarded RM600 Million Road Project In South India

NEW DELHI, Feb 23 (Bernama) -A consortium between Malaysia's IJM Corp and India's Infrastructure Development Finance Ltd (IDFC) bagged a road project worth about RM600 million (6.75 billion rupees)in south India.India's Road Transport and Highways Ministry's Secretary Brahma Dutt told reporters that the order was part of the five mega road-widening projects amounting to RM8.7 billion (US$2.7 billion) that was cleared by the Indian government.IDFC and IJM had formed a joint venture in the ratio of 50:50 to construct the 82.50-kilometre stretch between Chilkaluripet-Vijaywada in Andhra Pradesh, on India's National Highway (NH) 5.IJM country director for India, Ng Chin Meng, said it was the first design, built, finance and operate (DBFO) project awarded."The concession period is for 15 years. It will take 30 months to expand from the existing two lanes to six lanes," he told Bernama.The National Highway Authority of India (NHAI) also awarded Larsen & Toubro a project to widen highway in south India for nearly RM400 million (4.19 billion rupees), said Dutt.This project covers the 43-kilometre Chennai-Tada stretch on NH5.The NHAI on Friday awarded the five main projects to expand to six-lanes of the Golden Quadrilateral and the North-South corridor.The entire road expansion project in both these corridors will cover about 882 kilometres.IJM forayed into the Indian market in 1997 to exploit the growth opportunities in the Indian infrastructure sector, particularly in the construction and power sectors, and successfully completed several major highway projects.