NEW DELHI, Sept 9: The Defence minister Rajnath Singh and the union road transport and highways minister Nitin Gadkari on Thursday jointly inaugurated the country’s first Emergency Landing Facility (ELF) for the Indian Air Force (IAF) on the Satta-Gandhav stretch of National Highway (NH) 925A at Barmer in Rajasthan.
Speaking at the inauguration ceremony, Rajnath Singh hailed the “great feat” and said that the National Highway Authority of India (NHAI), which constructed the Barmer ELF, was preparing emergency landing fields at 20 locations and also constructing helipads in many other regions. “This emergency landing field and the three helipads will not only be useful in the time of war but to carry out rescue and relief operations during any natural disaster,” he said.
The Emergency Landing Facility (ELF) is part of a national highway that, for the first time ever, will be used for emergency landings of the Indian Air Force aircrafts. Video clips showed that a Sukhoi Su-30 MKI fighter aircraft and a Jaguar jet landed at the national highway in Rajasthan’s Jalore, showcasing the stretch of road that will be used for more such emergency landings of the armed forces.
According to the Union ministry of road transport and highways, the NHAI had developed a three-kilometre section of the Satta-Gandhav stretch of NH-925A from Km. 41/430 to Km. 44/430 as an Emergency Landing Facility for the Indian Air Force. It is a part of the newly developed two-lane paved shoulder of Gagariya-Bakhasar and Satta-Gandhav Section having a total length of 196.97 kilometres and costing ₹765.52 crores under Bharatmala Pariyojana.
An official statement from the road transport ministry said, “This project will improve connectivity between villages of Barmer and Jalore districts located on the international borders. The stretch is located in the western border area will facilitate the vigilance of the Indian Army as well as strengthen the basic infrastructure of the country.”
Speaking on the occasion, Gadkari said his department had achieved a couple of feats in recent times, besides building an airstrip for the Indian Air Force (IAF) in 15 days. He said the IAF chief RKS Bhadauria had said it usually took one-and-a-half years to build an airstrip. “I told him that we will construct these for you instead in 15 days of good quality.”
Talking about “three record feats” by his department, he said, “Despite (the prevalence of) Covid-19, we constructed 38km of road per day — highest in the world. Second is the construction of a 2.5-km 4-lane road in 24 hours on the Mumbai-Delhi express highway. The third refers to construction of a 26-km single lane road from Bijapur to Solapur in a day.”
Gadkari further said the defence ministry had his department’s full support in building an airport in the area. “There’s no airport here in an area of around 350km. I told CDS Bipin Rawat that we can give land to build a defence airport and a civil airport nearby. They have our full support and will take guidance from Air Force authority,” he added.
Earlier, a Hercules C-130J plane of the IAF, carrying Gadkari, Rajnath Singh and Bipin Rawat conducted a mock emergency landing on the national highway. NH-925 is India’s first national highway to be used for emergency landing of IAF aircraft.
Later Singh also inducted the Medium Range Surface to Air Missile (MRSAM)/Barak-8 weapons system for the IAF in Rajasthan’s Jaisalmer. The MRSAM missile system, jointly developed by India and Israel, is expected to provide a significant boost to the country’s air defence and combat capabilities. The two countries had successfully carried out tests earlier this year at a facility in India, which showed off the advanced medium-range missile equipped with advanced phased-array radar and interceptors with advanced RF seekers.
(Manas Dasgupta)
