17 Bids for NHAI's ₹8,300 Cr Odisha Coastal HAM

NHAI receives 17 bids for Rameshwar-Paradip coastal highway

The National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) has pulled 17 bids across two packages for the 160-km Rameshwar-Paradip coastal highway in Odisha, a greenfield Hybrid Annuity Model (HAM) corridor approved by the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs at a combined cost of ₹8,300.79 crore.

The response — 10 bids for Rameshwar-Konark and seven for Konark-Paradip — is the strongest recent signal of private contractor appetite for a project that has drifted for over a decade.

Package and procurement details

Lane configuration shift

Package I, the 79.4-km Rameshwar-Konark leg, is a four-lane access-controlled highway pegged at ₹5,304.8 crore.

Package II, the 80.7-km Konark-Paradip leg, has been cut from four lanes to a two-lane configuration with paved shoulders at ₹2,995.99 crore.

That downgrade, based on current and projected traffic, is the real development.

MoRTH and NHAI are no longer defaulting to four-laning; they are calibrating scope to demand, lowering capital intensity, strengthening bankability and containing construction risk.

HAM funding and timeline

The decision chain runs from the Cabinet Committee on Economic Affairs' June approval through MoRTH's September 1 disclosure to NHAI's procurement execution.

Bids opened on August 28; technical evaluation is under way and bidder names remain undisclosed.

Under HAM, NHAI funds 40 per cent of construction cost, the developer arranges the balance, and NHAI pays an inflation-indexed annuity.

Both packages carry ₹1,419.75 crore in land acquisition and pre-construction costs, making land handover schedule the key determinant of returns.

Strategic corridor and market outlook

The corridor anchors a 346-km greenfield link from Rameswar to Digha announced in 2015 and delayed by more than ten years; the DPR for the remaining stretch is still being prepared.

Once built, it offers long-distance traffic an alternative to NH-16 and NH-316, where ribbon development along the Puri-Satpada and Puri-Konark stretches has compressed speeds.

The alignment reaches Puri, Konark, Paradip Port, the upcoming Puri International Airport, and the emerging Astarang and Subarnarekha ports, cutting travel time by about two-and-a-half hours.

For bidders, exposure is tangible:

- Coastal terrain across six districts
- Land acquisition risk
- Annuity receipts tied to NHAI liquidity

Yet 17 bids suggest the market has accepted NHAI's de-risked scope.

The industry signal is a procurement reset, not just competitive tension.

Demand-calibrated lane configuration, bundled pre-construction costs and access-controlled design are becoming the template for greenfield coastal corridors — a playbook NHAI is likely to extend to the remaining Digha stretch.