Kohima, Feb. 2: The Nagaland government has proposed an 80-km diversion in the Dimapur-Imphal highway before making it a four-lane one.
Prime Minster Atal Bihari Vajpayee had announced a more than Rs 400-crore project to upgrade the National Highway 39, commonly known as Dimapur-Imphal highway here, during his visit to the state in October last year. The state government is understood to have proposed the diversion via Niuland to capital Kohima in fear of paying huge compensation to landowners if the present stretch was to be kept intact.
Nagaland resident commissioner Ponraj attended a meeting at the Prime Minister?s Office (PMO) in New Delhi on January 13 to discuss the modalities for the project. Though the state government was kept in the dark on the meeting, it is in the process of readying the diversion proposal, a senior official in the state department of planning and co-ordination said. ?We are very keen to go ahead and want to submit the proposal before the end of the financial year,? he said.
The distance from Dimapur to Kohima is 74 km. The proposed diversion will be from Dimapur to Niuland and then to Kohima via Kiroma. Kiroma is 12 km away from Kohima. The government was worried about the compensation to be paid to landowners in the urbanised outskirts of Dimapur.