India

Gadkari Announces AI‑Driven Road Quality Monitoring and Penalties for Defective Work

By Subhash Narayan

New Delhi – Road Transport and Highways Minister Nitin Gadkari announced that the government will deploy Network Surveillance Vehicles (NSVs) to detect potholes on national highways and hold contractors, consultants and officials accountable for poor road quality. He warned that those found compromising on quality would face penalties and blacklisting.

Speaking at the CII National Conference on Highways of India’s Future: Smart, Safe and Sustainable, Gadkari said the Ministry of Road Transport and Highways (MoRTH) has intensified quality monitoring, reducing reported construction‑quality problems by 30%. He added that he has personally reviewed hundreds of projects and that social media posts have helped flag quality issues. "We have seen a drop of 30% in such problems since we started monitoring these closely and am reasonably sure we will see the rest resolving over the next two years," he said.

NSVs are vehicle‑mounted, multi‑sensor platforms that assess road conditions and pavement quality at traffic speeds of 40–80 km/h. The ministry has mandated their use, with the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) deploying them to monitor road quality, plan repairs and feed data into AI‑based systems such as the RAMS Data Lake.

Gadkari noted that the ministry has already blacklisted several companies manufacturing bearings and expansion joints over quality concerns and is adopting a zero‑tolerance approach to lapses. The government is also expanding technology‑led road safety measures. AI‑based Advanced Traffic Management Systems will be deployed in the first phase across about 1,000 km of highways, with real‑time tracking of every movement. He stressed the importance of lane discipline in reducing road accidents and reiterated the need to adopt alternative and biofuels.

Akhilesh Srivastava, co‑chair of the CII National Taskforce on Road Safety and president of the India ITS Forum, said, "India is best in adopting technology. The next milestone is how many lives we can save on the road."

Gadkari said he is in talks with Bihar’s chief minister to sign a memorandum of understanding under which NHAI would dredge rivers free of cost and use the accumulated silt in highway construction, a move that would significantly reduce Bihar’s flood risk.

"India’s ambition to become a $5 trillion economy depends on robust infrastructure across water, power, transport and communications," Gadkari said, pointing to its role in industrial growth, trade and investment. He noted that India’s logistics costs fell from 16% of GDP two years ago to 9%, attributing the decline to improved roads. "Today, I am really happy that, as compared with the logistics cost, 8% of the GDP in China, 12% logistics cost of European countries and the US, now from 16%, Indian logistics cost is coming to single digits, that is 9%. I am confident that because of the good roads, our logistics cost is now in the single digits," he added.

Gadkari described infrastructure as the backbone of the economy, saying every ₹100 spent on infrastructure generates an economic impact of ₹325. "If we spend ₹100 for infrastructure, the impact on the economy is ₹325, where GDP is going to increase because of that. So it is very important to develop good roads, and we are giving the highest priority to that," he said.

At the conference, MV Satish, chair of the CII National Committee on Roads and Highways, said India’s road network needed to deliver not just faster connectivity but also greater durability, resource efficiency, environmental sustainability, safety and technological readiness. John Prasad Kandamparambil, country head (institutional business) at IOC, said infrastructure investment was a fundamental driver of long-term business and bitumen demand, noting that road construction involves a complete material ecosystem.

Subhash, the infrastructure editor at Mint, noted the fast‑changing developments in the Indian landscape.