COMMUNICATIONS

INTRODUCTION

THE BOMBAY-NAGPUR-HOWRAH TRUNK RAILWAY ROUTE of the Central Railway passes through the district from west to east for a distance of ahout 44.50 miles. A branch line emanates from this line at Jalamb upto Khamgaon. These routes have facilitated commercial traffic from the markets in this district to practically the major part of the State as also to many parts of India. Bul-dhana district can, therefore, be said to he well-served by railway communication. Though the railway lines do not touch the commercial centres in Central and Southern parts of the district, they benefit the important markets at Malkapur, Khamgaon, Shegaon, Jalamb and Nandura. All the railway stations are con-nected by good roads with the commercial centres in the district. The total route mileage in the district, viz., about 52.50 (84 km), however, does not compare favourably with many districts in the State. The railway length averages 1.40 miles per 100 sq. miles of area in the district, the corresponding average being 2.66 miles for Maharashtra.

The want of easy and perennial road communication in the past hindered the economic development of the district though it possessed many physical advantages. Maintenance of roads was particularly costly in the fertile black cotton soil areas, while the topography of the Satpuda and Ajanta ranges was a formidable hindrance to road development in those areas. These factors, coupled with some others, contrived against adequate road deve-lopment in the past. The Bombay-Nagpur-Calcutta national highway was by far the only important road in those days.

After Independence, however, road development received the active attention of the Government. The Road Development Plan, popularly known as the Nagpur Plan, accentuated the rate of growth of roads in the district. This is evidenced by the facts mentioned below and elsewhere in this chapter:—

During the period 1951—61, the length of national highways remained practically the same. The length of the state high-ways, however, increased by 131.29 miles. The length of major district roads increased by 72.65 miles and that of village roads by 29 miles. The length of the other district roads, however, decreased by 19.32 miles, which may be attributed to their up-gradation to standard of major district roads or other better cate-gories. The total increase in all types of roads (excluding muni-cipal roads) was thus, 213.66 miles.

Under the Nagpur Plan, the district road mileage was envisag-ed at 1,656. It was short of this target by 1,076.81 miles as on 31st March 1961. On 31st March 1962, improvement of the Chikhli-Jalna road was in progress while Lonar-Mantha Road was under construction.

By the end of the Second Five-Year Plan period, the total road length was 914 km. which amounted to 9.6 km. of road per 100 sq. km of area. The road works undertaken during the Third Plan were on the lines suggested under the Nagpur Plan. By the end of the Third Plan the total road length of 1,148 km was con-structed and the ratio worked to 10.7 km of roads to 100 sq. km of area. The total cost of road works completed during the Plan period amounted to Rs. 44.94 lakhs.

Table No. 1 below gives the statistics of various categories of roads in the district in 1961 and 1972 as also the target of road development from 1961 to 1981. Table No. 2 gives the surface classification of roads in March 1972.

TABLE No. 1

LENGTH OF VARIOUS CATEGORIES OF ROADS EXISTING IN
BULDHANA DISTRICT.

(Figures in Kilometres)

* Reduction in length because the alignment of the Bombay-Nagpur-Calcutta road was changed from Malkapur to Nandura so as to reduce the distance.

TABLE No. 2

SURFACE-WISE CLASSIFICATION OF ROADS IN BULDHANA DISTRICT
AS ON 31ST MARCH 1972.

Source: Bureau of Economics and Statistics.

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