Purvanchal Expressway - glittering crown in Uttar Pradesh

Infrastructure development is the key to development and good roads are paths to industrial progress.   Long ago experienced that .. .. the road from Rajahmundry to Samarlakota (in fact the entire corridor from Vijayawada to Visakhapatnam) was channelized and relaid under the then CM Chandra Babu Naidu – people kept wondering that the stretch of 60 odd km from Rjy to KKy was straight, brilliantly laid, hassle-free, making travel a pleasure, saving fuel and energy. 

Now this Expressway dedicated to the Nation is the most appreciated one. It starts in a village Chand Sarai and ends in another village Haidaria  on National Highway No.-19, before 18 KM of UP-Bihar border, in district Ghazipur; its total  length is 340.824 KM. This  341-kilometer-long expressway will reduce the travel time between Lucknow to Buxar in Bihar from seven hours to nearly four hours. Once it is opened to the public, the travel time from Lucknow to Ghazipur will be reduced from 6 hours to 3.5 hours. 

The Purvanchal Expressway stands  constructed at Rs.22,497 crore, and within three years on what PM Modi described as "just a piece of land". The Purvanchal Expressway   passes through nine Uttar Pradesh districts - Lucknow, Barabanki, Amethi, Ayodhya, Sultanpur, Ambedkar Nagar, Azamgarh, Mau and Ghazipur and is a jewel of accomplishment on Yogi Adityanath Ji. 

Emperor Bhoja  was a monarch from the Paramara dynasty. His kingdom  centered around the Malwa region in central India, where his capital Dhara-nagara (modern Dhar) was located.   At its zenith, his kingdom extended from Chittor in the north to upper Konkan in the south, and from the Sabarmati River in the west to Vidisha in the east. Bhoja is best known as a patron of arts, literature, and sciences. The establishment of the Bhoj Shala, a centre for Sanskrit studies, is attributed to him. He was a polymath, and several books covering a wide range of topics are attributed to him.  Because of his patronage to scholars, Bhoja became one of the most celebrated kings in the Indian history. After his death, he came to be featured in several legends as a righteous scholar-king. The body of legends clustered around him is comparable to that of the fabled Vikramaditya. 

Purvanchal is a geographic sub-region of Uttar Pradesh that is within the larger Bhojpuri region. It comprises the eastern end of Uttar Pradesh.  The Bhojpuri region or Bhojpur is an area encompassing parts of the states of Bihar and Uttar Pradesh in northern India where the Bhojpuri is spoken as the mother-tongue.   

Purvanchal Expressway  is a 340.8 km long, 6-lane wide  access-controlled expressway in the state of Uttar Pradesh.   It is developed by the Uttar Pradesh Expressways Industrial Development Authority (UPEIDA). The Purvanchal Expressway has a 3.2 km long airstrip at Akhalkiri Karwat village near Kurebhar in Sultanpur district for emergency landing of aircrafts.  The construction work was started by the UPEIDA on 10 October 2018 and inaugurated on 16 November 2021. 

It was a great moment of pride for the Nation as our Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modiji  arrived at the inauguration site in the C-130 Hercules and later a touch and go exercise was also performed on the expressway by the Indian Air Force (IAF).  Indian Air Force fighter jets performed the 'touch and go' operation, under which 30 fighter planes touched the Purvanchal expressway airstrip and then took off. Fighter jets including Mirage 2000, AN-32, Jaguar, and Sukhoi performed touch and go operations and showcased a landing on the expressway. The Indian aircrafts showcased tricolor in the sky.  The expressway is to be linked with Varanasi–Azamgarh highway through a separate link road.   

The 28 districts of Purvanchal have 164 seats in the Uttar Pradesh Assembly - around 33 per cent seats of the 403-member house. The BJP swept the entire region in the 2014 parliamentary polls. In the 2017 Uttar Pradesh Assembly election, the BJP bagged 115 of 164 seats.  Keeping its mojo intact in Purvanchal would be critical to the BJP's success in the Uttar Pradesh Assembly election early next year.   

                PM Modi inaugurated an international airport in Kushinagar - Uttar Pradesh's third. He dedicated development projects worth Rs 5,229 crore to the people of Varanasi. He addressed a public rally at Siddharthnagar announcing medical infrastructure projects including nine medical colleges and hospitals with 2,500 beds. 

Lot happening in our mother India as the Nation is poised for more growth under the present regime.  The Chief Minister of the State Shri Yogi Adityanathji and Prime Minister Shri Narendra Modiji deserves great appreciation for their visionary thinking and implementation. 

With regards – S. Sampathkumar
18.11.2021.