COMMUNICATION STRATEGY FOR INFRASTRUCTURE

DEVELOPMENTS

The year 2020-2021 has witnessed the national and international economy bear
the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, which also reflected on the
transportation sector, including Road, Railways, Ports-shipping and aviation
sectors.
Infrastructure Developments:
1. Railways:
1.1 Indian Railways, besides possessing remarkable resource mobilisation
capabilities and disciplined manpower, have demonstrated agility and
 ingenuity to cater to completely new requirements that arose in India’s
fight against COVID-19.
It has played a crucial part in maintaining the supply of essential items
and helping livelihoods by stepping up the transportation of goods – such
as food-grains, milk and dairy products, farm produce, medicines etc. –
by: Changing the traditional traffic routes, wherever required;
aggregating small parcels and operating parcel cargo trains; and
transporting critical medical equipment and Personal Protection
Equipment (PPE).
1.2 Indian Railway has leveraged its resources and demonstrated the
capability to manufacture PPE, ventilators, hospital beds and COVID-19
isolation coaches. It has also used its outreach to distribute food and
rations in far flung regions. The ingenuity came alive in operating
‘Anaconda’ trains, which are thrice the standard length, and the launch of
‘SETU’ – a one stop helpline for parcel traffic to bridge the gaps in the
supply chain
1.3 Amid the rising cases of covid-19 cases during 2nd wave in the
country and the transportation of medical oxygen became a crucial issue,
Indian Railways took the movement of oxygen express as a challenge and
successfully ran the first oxygen expresses.
Transportation of oxygen through trains is faster over long distances than
road transport. Transportation through rail takes 2 days while through
road it takes 3 days. Trains can run 24 hours a day but truck drivers need
to take halts etc. The green corridor is created for the faster movement of
these tankers and monitoring of movement was done at the apex level.

2. Road :
2.1 Bharatmala: It connects the major economic poles of the country and
ensures the border & international connectivity, coastal and port related
Connectivity. Overall 65,000 km long road has been constructed.
2.2 Economic Corridors : Apart from existing Golden Quadrilateral (GQ)
and North South-East West (NS-EW) Corridors, new economic corridors
are being built.
2.3 Reducing congestion on roads : Through the construction and
development of multimodal logistics parks, bypass, rig road, etc we have
successfully reduce congestion on roads.
 2.4 Special emphasis on border and coastal areas: To promote Import-
Exports (Exim) of India the border and coastal area structural facilities
are being developed.
2.5 Government Initiatives:
During the second wave of Covid19 crisis several hospitals in the
different parts of country raised an SOS alarm over shortage of oxygen
supply. The green corridor has been provided by different state
authorities in order to ensure efficient movement of the tanker.
e - pass system
It was launched to facilitate online passes for movement of vehicles for
essential services during COVID19 lockdown.

3. Waterways :
3.1 Inland waterways have been declared as national waterways. Until the
year 2014 There were only five national waterways in the country. 106
new national waterways were announced simultaneously, now there are
111 national waterways in the country. Inland waterways reduce the total
logistic costs, improving the connectivity and promoting a multimodal
system for employment generation.
4. Shipping :
4.1 Using 7,500 km long coastline in the country government promoted
Sagarmala Port-based development project. This led to modernisation of
ports, development of new ports, increase port connectivity, ensure
industrialisation of ports and will help in development of coastal
community.
5. Aviation :
5.1 UDAN : (Use Desh ka Aam nagarik)
‘मेरा सपना यह रहा है कि ‘हवाई चप्पल’ पहनने वाला व्यक्ति भी ‘हवाई जहाज’ से सफर करे’ – प्रधानमंत्री नरेन्द्र मोदी

National Civil Aviation Policy: Objective is to improve regional

connectivity with green field construction of Small Regional Airports.
5.2 Lifeline UDAN: The ‘Lifeline Udan’ flights are being operated by the
Ministry of Civil Aviation and Air India to transport essential medical
cargo to remote parts of the country to support India’s war against
COVID-19.
Under Lifeline UDAN, 116 flights have been operated by Air India,
Alliance Air, Indian Air Force, Pawan Hans, and private carriers.