Godhra, which caught global attention after burning of the Sabarmati train in 2002 and the state-wide communal riots in its aftermath, has finally snared the state government’s attention as far as development is concerned.

Chief Minister Narendra Modi on January 17 will lay the foundation stone of a

Rs 800-crore project for construction of Halol-Godhra-Shamlaji National Highway by Larsen and Toubro Limited under the private-public partnership scheme.

According to the state government officials, the road, once completed, will function as an alternative route between Gujarat and Delhi and will reduce the distance between Vadodara and Delhi by at least 45 km.

The officials connected with the project said that the highway would give an impetus to industrial growth in the tribal-dominated Panchmahals district with Godhra as its headquarters. As the highway will grant easy access to these areas, the corporate houses will be encouraged to shift their additional units here and avail of tax holidays and other facilities extended by the state government, they said.

An official said that new industrial estates were likely to be set up at Kadana, Khanpur, Santrampur, Morwa-Hadap and Gogamba, located within a radius of 30 to 40 km of this route.

The industries set up here can also benefit from cheap labour as most of the tribal workers of the district migrate to as far as Bhuj in Kutch district, and Surat and Vapi in south Gujarat.

District collector Milind Torawane told Newsline that this national highway would prove to be a boon for the development of the region. He said that the land for the highway had already been acquired and the construction work would begin soon after ‘bhoomi pujan' by the chief minister.

The state government has also approved the proposal to set up an engineering college in Godhra which is expected to start classes from the next academic year. An agriculture engineering college, the second in the state, has already started from June 2008.

About the proposed 30-km long Godhra-Ahmedabad bypass road, which is pending for the last five years after getting clearance from the state government, Torawane said that with the land alignment of the bypass being in the last phase, the construction work would begin soon.

The water woes faced by the residents of Godhra will also be over with the commencement of the Rs 46 crore state-of-the art water filtration plant.