Ganga Expressway to become Uttar Pradesh's longest expressway, here's all you need to know

The Ganga Expressway will pass through 12 districts of Uttar Pradesh.

New Delhi: Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Saturday (December 18, 2021) laid the foundation stone of the Ganga Expressway in Uttar Pradesh's Shahjahanpur.

Upon completion of work, it will become the longest expressway of Uttar Pradesh and will connect the western and eastern regions of the state.

Here's all you need to know about Ganga Expressway 

• Ganga Expressway is a 594-km long six-lane Expressway.
  
• It will be built at a cost of over Rs 36,200 crore.
  
• It will start near the Bijauli village in Meerut and will extend till near the Judapur Dandu village in Prayagraj.
  
• It will pass through 12 districts of Uttar Pradesh.
  
• It will pass through Meerut, Hapur, Bulandshahr, Amroha, Sambhal, Budaun, Shahjahanpur, Hardoi, Unnao, Rae Bareli, Pratapgarh and Prayagraj.
  
• It will have a 3.5-km long airstrip for assisting emergency take-off and the landing of Air Force planes.
  
• An industrial corridor is also proposed to be built along the Ganga Expressway.
  
• According to the Prime Minister's Office, the inspiration behind the Expressway is the vision of PM Modi to provide fast-paced connectivity across the country.

• The PMO said that the Ganga Expressway will also give a fillip to multiple sectors including industrial development, trade, agriculture, tourism etc and will provide a big boost to the socio-economic development of the region.

The foundation stone laying ceremony comes a month after Prime Minister Modi inaugurated the Purvanchal Expressway at Karwal Kheri in Sultanpur district. The expressway was said to be the dream project of the state government and Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath.

The developments come ahead of the 2022 UP Assembly elections and have already steered a political debate. 

Earlier on December 17, Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav had claimed that the Ganga Expressway project was started by Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP) supremo Mayawati during her tenure as state's chief minister. 

"This is not Samajwadi Party's Expressway. The BJP is doing the foundation laying of the programme started by Mayawati. She had dreamt of Ganga Expressway. I think after the foundation stone laying of programmes initiated by the Samajwadi Party government, the Centre has now started to lay the foundation stone of the programmes of the BSP," Yadav said.