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Union Minister Nitin Gadkari’s recent call for “qualitative reforms” in Detailed Project Reports (DPRs) for national highways is a welcome and urgent diagnosis of a critical problem. By linking poor-quality DPRs directly to road accidents and fatalities, he has rightly identified a foundational flaw in our infrastructure development process. However, the solution requires more than just spending more on better consultants; it demands a fundamental rethink of the very purpose of a DPR and who should be responsible for it.
Currently, a deeply ingrained but counterproductive practice is plaguing our road projects. As highlighted in recent contractual research, our highway authorities, such as the NHAI and MoRTH, often prepare a highly detailed DPR before tendering and then treat it as a binding bible for the contractor. This sounds logical on paper, but in practice, it fundamentally breaks the engineering and risk-sharing model of modern contracts like EPC (Engineering, Procurement, and Construction) and HAM (Hybrid Annuity Model).
The Core Conflict: Who Owns the Design?
The entire philosophy of an EPC or HAM project is based on single-point responsibility. The government (the Authority) defines the what—the road’s alignment, performance standards, and specifications. The contractor, selected for its technical expertise, is then entrusted with the how—the detailed design and construction. This allows for innovation, value engineering, and site-specific optimizations that save time and money.
The current practice turns this logic on its head. The Authority’s pre-tender DPR dictates the ‘how’, creating a parallel design narrative. When the contractor’s engineers, post-award, propose a technically superior or more cost-effective solution—a better pavement design or a more suitable bridge foundation—they are often blocked because it deviates from the Authority’s DPR. This leads to immediate conflict, delays in approval, and kills the very innovation these contract models were designed to foster.
Minister Gadkari’s admission that “not a single project DPR in the last 10 years was without a black spot” is a stunning indictment of this system. These “black spots” are not just statistical anomalies; they are often the direct result of flawed assumptions, outdated data, or rigid designs locked in at the DPR stage, which the contractor is powerless to correct.
The Domino Effect of a Flawed DPR
The repercussions are a cascade of inefficiencies that Gadkari aims to solve:
- Cost Escalation: As the minister noted, a qualitative DPR can save 25% of construction costs. The opposite is also true. A rigid DPR forces contractors to include a “rigidity risk premium” in their bids, accounting for anticipated fights and delays. Furthermore, when the contractor’s detailed ground investigation (done after winning the bid) reveals soil conditions different from the DPR’s assumptions, it triggers massive cost overruns and disputes over who pays for the redesign.
- Time Overruns and Litigation: The system creates a “deemed approval” trap. Contracts state that if the authority’s engineer doesn’t respond to a design within a set period, it is automatically approved. But when the authority is wedded to its own DPR, this mechanism fails. Objections based on “non-compliance with our DPR” rather than “non-compliance with the contract” create legal limbo, stalling projects and fuelling the litigation and arbitration Gadkari wants to reduce.
- Stifled Safety and Innovation: A DPR based on superficial surveys can miss critical underground utilities or misjudge soil stability. When these are discovered mid-construction, it leads to emergency redesigns, work stoppages, and can compromise final road safety. Contractors, discouraged from innovating, simply build to the outdated DPR, perpetuating suboptimal and sometimes dangerous outcomes.
The Path to True Reform
Minister Gadkari’s openness to “transformative changes” is the key. The solution is not just to make existing DPRs more expensive, but to redefine their role entirely.
- Shift from DPR to Robust Feasibility Study: The Authority should focus its resources on creating a high-quality, data-rich Feasibility Study. This document should definitively establish the what: the project’s need, broad alignment, land acquisition scope, and performance standards. It must be based on high-quality, independently audited geotechnical and utility surveys to minimize post-bid surprises.
- Empower the Contractor for the DPR: The DPR must be the responsibility of the selected contractor. The tender documents must explicitly state that any pre-tender DPR provided is for “informational purposes only” and is not binding. This unleashes the contractor’s expertise to deliver the most efficient, safe, and economical detailed design.
- Fortify Contracts with Clarity: Model contracts need clauses that explicitly protect the contractor’s design mandate. The contractor’s obligation should be to meet the performance standards in the contract, not to slavishly follow the geometry of a pre-tender document.
By making this strategic shift, we can transform the DPR from a source of conflict into an engine of efficiency. It aligns with global best practices and the original intent of our own contract models. Minister Gadkari has correctly identified the disease. The cure lies in surgically separating the government’s strategic role of defining the project’s goals from the contractor’s technical role of designing the best way to achieve them. This is the qualitative reform that will truly build safer roads, faster and at a lower cost to the public.
These pieces are being published as they have been received – they have not been edited/fact-checked by ThePrint.