Nitin Gadkari

Nitin Jairam Gadkari (born 27 May 1957) is an Indian politician from Maharashtra who is the current Minister for Road Transport & Highways in the Government of India.

He is also the longest serving Minister for Road Transport & Highways currently running his tenure for over nine years.

Gadkari was born into a Marathi family in Nagpur, India to Jairam Gadkari and Bhanutai Gadkari on 27 May 1957.

During his adolescence, he worked for the Bharatiya Janata Yuva Morcha and the student union Akhil Bharatiya Vidyarthi Parishad.

He completed M.Com. and LL.B. from Nagpur University.

In 1990, the Government of Maharashtra conducted feasibility studies for the new expressway to be operated on a toll basis, however, it was only after Gadkari took over as PWD Minister that the construction of this project was fast-tracked.

Gadkari served as the Minister of Public Works Department (PWD) of the Government of Maharashtra from 1995 to 1999 and restructured it from top to bottom.

He has served as the president of the Maharashtra state unit of BJP.

Gadkari strongly supported privatisation while he campaigned for investments in infrastructure from private firms.

He addressed several meetings between private investors, contractors, builders and various trade organisations and diverted large amounts of budgeted projects towards privatisation.

Subsequently, the state government allocated ₹7 billion for rural connectivity.

Over the next four years, all-weather road connectivity in Maharashtra was extended to 98% of the population.

The project aimed to connect 13,736 remote villages which remained unconnected since independence by road.

It also helped ameliorate malnutrition in remote Melghat-Dharni area of Amravati district, which previously had no access to medical aid, ration or educational facilities.

The Union Government appointed him as the Chairman of National Rural Road Development Committee.

After a series of meetings and studies, Gadkari submitted his report to the central government and gave the presentation to Atal Bihari Vajpayee, then Prime Minister of India.

His new report was accepted and Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana, an ambitious rural road connecting scheme worth ₹600 billion, was launched.

Gadkari entrusted the work of the construction of Mumbai-Pune expressway to MSRDC in March 1997 on Build-Operate-Transfer basis with permission to collect toll for 30 years.

The tender notice was published in leading newspapers all over India and also on the Internet.

Due to the wide publicity, 133 tenders were sold and on 18 December 1997, 55 tenders were received.

After technical and financial evaluation, tenders were accepted and work orders were given on 1 January 1998 to four contractors.

Thereafter tenders for widening of the Khandala and Lonavala-Khandala bypass works were invited.

The tenders were received on 24 August 1998 and orders were issued on 4 September 1998.

The first sections of the Expressway opened in 2000, and the entire route was completed, opened to traffic and made fully operational from April 2002.

The other major achievement of Gadkari as state minister was the construction of 55 flyovers in Mumbai, which eased the city traffic problems significantly.

Gadkari earlier served as the President of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) from 2009 to 2013.

He is also known for his work as the Public Works Department Minister of the State of Maharashtra, where, under his leadership, a series of roads, highways and flyovers across the state were constructed.

He currently represents the Nagpur constituency in the Lok Sabha and is a lawyer by occupation.

He previously also served as a Minister in various departments which includes Water resources and River development, Shipping, Rural Development and MSME.

During the cabinet reshuffle on 7 July 2021, the portfolio for the Ministry of MSME which was under him was reassigned to Narayan Rane, another BJP MP from Maharashtra as a part of cabinet expansion.

He is often referred to as the "Expressway Man of India" by the media due to his initiation of the Mumbai-Pune Expressway and contributions to the development of expressways and other road infrastructure.

The World Economic Forum has recognised him as the "pioneer of public–private partnership (PPP) in the road sector in India".

Under his tenure as Minister of Road and Transport, Indian highway network grew by 59% within 9 years.

Gadkari was appointed the president of the BJP in December 2009.

This was considering a tough phase for the BJP as the party had lost two successive Lok Sabha elections and needed a quick revamp.

In his book India Aspires, co-authored with Tuhin Sinha, Gadkari spells out his development ideas for the country in great detail.

Increased institutional support to green energy, alternate fuel and effective waste management hold special importance in Gadkari's development plan.

As BJP party president, Gadkari, re-emphasised on legendary Jan Sangh leader Deen Dayal Upadhya's principles of Integral Humanism and Antyodaya (upliftment of the poor).

He received the Late Madhavrao Limaye Award by Public Library Nashik, for Most Efficient Member of Parliament for 2020-21.

As PWD Minister of Maharashtra, Gadkari played a crucial role in expediting the construction of the Mumbai-Pune Expressway.