India has had major cost and time overruns as a result of implementation issues with many infrastructure development projects. The fact that different government departments and ministries operate in silos with little or no coordination between them and a lot of bureaucratic red tape was a major factor in the time and expense overrun. Additionally, this results in the ineffective use of resources.
This is what the PM Gati Shakti National Master Plan (PMGS-NMP) framework, which was introduced in October 2021, seeks to address by enlisting the support of numerous ministries and enhancing coordination.
Through efficient multimodal connection and infrastructure development, this will accelerate infrastructure development and assist economic growth. With a focus on delivering multimodal connectivity infrastructure to various economic zones, PMGS-NMP is an integrated strategy to infrastructure development in India.
The scope of PMGS-NMP largely includes projects established by both the federal and state governments, and it includes projects throughout the seven infrastructure sectors (also known as the seven engines: railways, roads, ports, waterways, airports, mass transportation, and logistics infrastructure).
The National Infrastructure Pipeline (NIP) projects related to these seven engines will be in keeping with the PM Gati Shakti framework. In order to increase connectivity, it would cover the infrastructure plans of many ministries and state governments, such as UDAN, Bharatmala (economic zones), SagarMala (ports), inland waterways, dry/land ports, and Bharatmala (highways).
By enlisting the technical assistance of the Capacity Building Commission, the central ministries, the state governments, and their infra-agencies, the PM Gati Shakti framework suggests increasing capacity in planning, design, finance, and implementation management. If implemented as intended, the Gati Shakti framework has the potential to significantly aid the government in achieving its goal of lowering the cost of logistics by 4-5 percent, from the current level of roughly 13–14% of GDP to about 9% of it in the next 3–5 years.