New Delhi, June 7
In a big push for industrialisation in the northern states, Prime Minister Manmohan Singh today gave the go ahead for the Amritsar-Delhi-Kolkata industrial corridor. It will cover the cities of Amritsar, Jalandhar and Ludhiana in Punjab and Ambala in Haryana.

According to a statement by the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO), the Prime Minister has approved the commencement of preparatory work for the industrial corridor stretching from Punjab to West Bengal by setting up an inter-ministerial group consisting of secretaries of the ministries of Industry, Finance, Road Transport, Shipping and chairman, Railway Board.

This Inter-Ministerial Group will examine the feasibility of setting up this industrial corridor along with the structural and financing arrangements that would be required to operationalise it at the earliest. The IMG will give its report within a month. The Amritsar-Delhi-Kolkata industrial corridor is modelled on the Delhi Mumbai Industrial Corridor (DMIC) for which work is in progress. This is part of the government plan to unlock new infrastructure programmes to spur economic growth which in turn creates jobs.

This project is estimated to create 3 million jobs, 5 metro networks, including bullet trains and 8-10 industrial zones. It will also lead to unlocking of new cities, creation of world class infrastructure, including airports and creation of national manufacturing zones which are large sized industrial townships. The rub off effect will be that prices of land in the vicinity of the corridor will go up as development of the corridor picks up speed.

While the DMIC covers the western part of the country stretching from Rajasthan to Gujarat, the Amritsar - Delhi - Kolkata Industrial Corridor will stretch from north to east and use the Eastern dedicated Freight Corridor as the backbone.

The Eastern DFC extends from Ludhiana in Punjab to Dankuni near Kolkata. Therefore, the Amritsar - Delhi - Kolkata Industrial Corridor will be structured around the Eastern DFC and also the highway system that exists on this route.

It will also leverage the inland waterway system being developed along National Waterway - 1 which extends from Allahabad to Haldia. The Amritsar - Delhi - Kolkata Industrial Corridor will cover the states of Punjab, Haryana,

Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Bihar, Jharkhand and West Bengal. This is one of the most densely populated regions in the world and houses about 40 per cent of India's population.

According to the PMO, this is a region which needs a major push for industrialisation and job-creation and the Amritsar - Delhi - Kolkata Industrial Corridor will act as a catalyst for this growth. The corridor will cover the cities of Amritsar, Jalandhar, Ludhiana, Ambala, Saharanpur, Delhi, Roorkee, Moradabad, Bareilly, Aligarh, Kanpur, Lucknow, Allahabad, Varanasi, Patna, Hazaribagh, Dhanbad, Asansol, Durgapur and Kolkata.