Under a new policy, all road highway projects are to be earmarked from the beginning to one of three processes of bidding, on the basis of its financial viability. This pre-selection is estimated to save up to 18 months of time.

Earlier, every project was first put under the build operate and transfer (BOT) toll bidding process. If there was no positive response, it was put under the BOT annuity bidding process, where the contractor is paid every six months and the toll is collected by the government. A third option was an engineering procurement and construction (EPC) contract.

However, the process of trying different bidding processes would take about six months at every phase, and so, an escalation in project cost. And, the government failed to meet the target date of completion.

Under the new plan, all projects are divided into three categories — BOT-toll, BOT-annuity or EPC — even before the bidding process starts.