Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana Phase IV To Connect 25,000 Rural Habitations: Union Budget 2024

The central government is set to launch Phase 4 of the Pradhan Mantri Gram Sadak Yojana (PMGSY), aiming to provide all-weather roads to 25,000 rural habitats.

Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman announced this in Union budget 2024. This initiative focuses on enhancing connectivity and supporting economic development in rural areas.

As per National Rural Infrastructure Development Agency (NRIDA) a total of 765,472 km of road length has been constructed under various interventions of PMGSY.

The PMGSY was first launched on 25 December 2000, by the National Democratic Alliance government under the then prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee.

The initiative aimed to provide all-weather access to unconnected habitations with populations of up to 500 in plain areas and 250 and above in special category states (North East, Jammu and Kashmir, Himachal Pradesh, Uttarakhand), Desert Areas identified by the Desert Development Programme, and 88 selected backward districts identified by the Ministry of Home Affairs/Planning Commission as part of a poverty alleviation strategy.

Phase 2 of PMGSY began in 2013, followed by the introduction of the Road Connectivity Project for Left Wing Extremism Affected Areas (RCPLWEA) in 2016, focusing on constructing rural roads in regions affected by left-wing extremism. The third phase of PMGSY was launched in 2019, reports Financial Express.

The primary objective of PMGSY is to build robust, all-weather roads in rural habitations, with Panchayati Raj and elected local representatives deciding which habitations to prioritise.

The scheme was centrally funded only up to 2015-16. Since then, funding has been shared between the Centre and the states.