Growth of Infrastructure Sector: A Potential Boost to the Indian Economy

Introduction
Indian economy is driven through multiple economic sectors and infrastructure is one of the major sector contributions to continuous growth. The infrastructure sector in India is poised to grow at a CAGR of 8.2% by 2027. The launch of a quadrilateral economic forum by India, the US, Israel & the UAE in November 2021 has further added to the influx of infrastructure growth perspectives. Alternatively, the introduction to the “Infrastructure for Resilient Island States” program in November 2021 has shown a significant opportunity to improve the lives of vulnerable nations across the globe by enabling Indian infrastructure growth to flourish in tri-folds.

In order to meet India’s aim of reaching a US$ 5 trillion economy by 2025, infrastructure development is the need of the hour. The government has launched the National Infrastructure Pipeline (NIP) combined with other initiatives such as ‘Make in India’ and the production-linked incentives (PLI) scheme to augment the growth of the infrastructure sector. Historically, more than 80% of the country's infrastructure spending has gone toward funding for transportation, electricity, and water& irrigation.

In India, about 42% of the projects in the NIP are under implementation, which means construction work is already going on. Another 19% is under the development stage, while a significant 31% is still in the conceptual stage. During the fiscals 2020 to 2025, sectors such as Energy (24%), Roads (19%), Urban (16%), and Railways (13%) amount to around 70% of the projected capital expenditure in infrastructure in India.

Infrastructural Projects in India
Major/Key infrastructural projects undertaken in India are

• Gati Shakti and Industrial Corridors
• Bharatmala Pariyojana
• Delhi Mumbai Industrial Corridor

Gati Shakti and Industrial Corridors:
The main objective of the Gati Shakti and Industrial Projects corridor implemented in India in 2019 is to ensure integrated planning and implementation of basic infrastructure projects over the next four years, with a focus on expediting on-groundwork, cost reduction, and employment generation. The 'National Infrastructure Pipeline' of US$ 1,327 billion (Rs 110 lakh crores) launched in the year 2019 under the Gati Shakti scheme will be included.

Bharatmala Pariyojana
Bharatmala Pariyojana is a new umbrella program for the highways sector that focuses on optimizing the efficiency of freight and passenger movement across the country by bridging critical infrastructure gaps through effective interventions like the development of Economic Corridors, Inter Corridors, and Feeder Routes, National Corridor Efficiency Improvement, Border and International connectivity roads, Coastal and Port connectivity roads, and Green-field expressways. Under the first phase of the ambitious 'Bharatmala Project' of the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways, 34,800 km of national highways will be constructed at a cost of US$ 64 billion (Rs 5,35,000 crores).

Delhi-Mumbai Industrial Corridor
The Delhi-Mumbai Industrial Corridor (DMIC) is the first industrial corridor development project announced by the Government of India. The Delhi-Mumbai Industrial Corridor Development Corporation (DMICDC), the implementing agency of this development project, was incorporated in the year 2008.

The total sanctioned amount for this program is about US$ 2.4 billion (Rs 20,084 crores). 11 industrial corridor projects have been taken up under the programme, and a total of 30 projects will be developed under the program in four phases by 2024-25. The National Industrial Corridor Development and Implementation Trust (NICDIT) is functioning under the administrative control of the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT) for coordinated and integrated development of all the Industrial Corridors that are at various stages of development and implementation.

FDI in Infrastructure in India
Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) in the construction development (townships, housing, built-up infrastructure, and construction development projects) and construction (infrastructure) activity sectors stood at US$ 26.17 billion and US$ 26.30 billion, respectively, from April 2000 – Dec 2021, according to the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT). Infrastructure-related operations made about 13% of the US$ 81.72 billion total FDI inflows in the financial year (FY) 2021. India's infrastructure is anticipated to expand at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of almost 7% during the forecast period (2019-2028).

Highway construction would be done, with 2,500 km of access control highways, 9,000 km of economic corridors, 2,000 km of coastline and land port roads, and 2,000 km of strategic highways. The FASTag system promotes greater highway commercialization, allowing the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) to raise more funds. Before 2024, it was projected to monetize at least 12 lots of roadway bundles totalling more than 6,000 km. The government has set aside US$ 236 billion (Rs. 1,963,943 crores) in the budget for road infrastructure.

The government-sponsored National Investment and Infrastructure Fund (NIIF) received a funding commitment of US$ 100 million from the multilateral Asian Development Bank (ADB) in 2020. Between the financial years (FY) 2000 and (FY) 2019, inflows in the verticals of townships, construction development projects, and housing were estimated at US$ 25.5 billion. The "Smart Cities Mission" and "Housing for All" programmes have benefited from these initiatives. Saudi Arabia seeks to spend up to US$ 100 billion in India in energy, petrochemicals, refinery, infrastructure, agriculture, minerals, and mining.

Infrastructure Growth Highlights

Surety Bond Insurance
The road, transport, and highways ministry launched the country's first-ever surety bond insurance product, a move that would reduce the dependence of infra developers on bank guarantees.

Surety Bond Insurance acts as a security arrangement for infrastructure projects and insulates the contractor as well as the principal. The product caters to the requirements of a diversified group of contractors, many of whom are operating in today’s increasingly volatile environment. The Surety Bond Insurance is a risk transfer tool for the principal and shields the principal from the losses that may arise in case the contractor fails to perform their contractual obligation.

Research Development
According to the Ministry of Road Transport & Highways, National Institute of Technology, Silchar, (NIT Silchar) and National Highways Infrastructure Development Corporation Limited (NHIDCL), have signed an MoU to boost cooperation in the field of highway engineering and other infrastructure works.

“National Highways & Infrastructure Development Corporation Ltd (NHIDCL), a CPSE under the Ministry of Road Transport & Highways has signed MoU with NIT, Silchar on 26th October 2022 for seeking and promoting innovative technologies to find pragmatic solutions to the challenges posed in the construction of highways facing extreme climatic conditions".

Road & Transport System
National highways account for 2% of the total road network and carry over 40% of total traffic. Highway construction in India increased at 17.00% CAGR between FY16-FY21. Despite the pandemic and lockdown, India has constructed 13,298 km of highways in FY21. In FY21, 13,298 km of the highway was constructed across India.

The market for roads and highways is projected to exhibit a CAGR of 36.16% during 2016-2025. Almost 40% (824) of the 1,824 PPP projects awarded in India until December 2019 were related to roads.

The highways sector in India has been at the forefront of performance and innovation. The government has successfully rolled out over 60 projects worth over US$ 10 billion based on the Hybrid Annuity Model (HAM). HAM has balanced risk appropriately between private and public partners and boosted PPP activity in the sector.

Road to Future
The roadmap to India’s infrastructure is exciting and the new decade seems to be promising. More and more green and clean initiatives are happening across government bodies in major countries, especially, the Indian government has given the much-needed push to the infrastructure sector in the recent 2021 budget. India is looking at a US$ 5 trillion economy dream.

As per the Department for Promotion of Industry and Internal Trade (DPIIT), FDIs in the construction development and construction sector stood at US$ 26.17 billion and US$ 26.30 billion, respectively, between the period of April 2000 and December 2021. The logistics sector in India is rising at a CAGR of 10.5% annually which shows that both in terms of investments and revenue the infra game is going strong.

India is now at a juncture where a huge investment in R&D for energy-efficient and green fuel is much-needed. Thus, boosting the overall infrastructure.