New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi Wednesday unveiled PM GatiShakti - National Master Plan, a digital platform that will bring 16 ministries and departments together for multi-modal connectivity to economic zones.
According to the government, GatiShakti will target integrated planning and coordinated implementation of all infrastructure connectivity projects.
The platform has all those projects in GIS mode, which are to be completed by 2024-25, with high resolution satellite images, infrastructure, utilities, administrative boundaries, land and logistics.
"GatiShakti will be a National Infrastructure Master Plan for our country which will lay the foundation of holistic infrastructure. Right now, there is no coordination between our means of transport. Gati Shakti will break the silos and will remove all these obstacles," PTI reported an official as saying.
PM Modi had announced the project in his Independence Day speech on August 15 this year. He had said the project would be a source of future employment opportunities for lakhs of youth in the country.
“In the coming days, we will launch PM Gati Shakti Plan, a 100 lakh crore national infrastructure master plan which will make a foundation for holistic infrastructure and give an integrated pathway to our economy,” Modi said.
Key Points Of PM GatiShakti - National Master Plan
1. GatiShakti will incorporate the infrastructure schemes of various Union ministries and state governments — Bharatmala, Sagarmala, UDAN, inland waterways, dry/land ports etc.
2. Economic Zones such as textile, pharmaceutical and fishing clusters, electronic parks, defence and industrial corridors, and agriculture zones will be covered to improve connectivity.
3. Technology, including spatial planning tools with ISRO imagery developed by the Bhaskaracharya National Institute for Space Applications and Geoinformatics (BiSAG-N) will be leveraged. BiSAG-N functions under the Ministry of Information Technology (MeITY).
4. GatiShakti aims to increase productivity of industry, enhance their competitiveness, support local manufacturers, and also help in developing new possibilities for new economic zones.
5. The master plan has been prepared depicting economic zones and the infrastructure linkages that are required to support them to ensure seamless movement of goods.
6. The Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) will be the nodal ministry, and it will monitor and implement all the projects, with a national planning group regularly taking stock.
7. An empowered group of secretaries under the chairmanship of the cabinet secretary will be formed to approve any changes required in the master plan.
8. All existing and proposed economic zones have been mapped on a single platform in three time periods — status as of 2014-15, achievements by 2020-21, planned interventions up to 2024-25.
9. The public and business community will get information regarding the upcoming connectivity projects, industrial areas, other business hubs and the surrounding environment so investors can plan their businesses.
10. The plan envisages creation of multiple employment opportunities, and aims to improve the “global competitiveness of local products by cutting down the logistics costs and improving the supply chains”, also ensuring proper linkages for local industry and consumers, the government has said.