It will now be possible to cover the road distance between Surat and Chennai in 17 hours as approved by the Centre ₹19,142 crore National Highway Investment Plan. This major road project will reduce travel time by 14 hours from the previous 31 hours.
On December 31, 2025, the Cabinet gave the green light to the construction of a portion of the Surat-Chennai High Speed Corridor — the 374 km long Nashik-Solapur-Akkalkot expressway in Maharashtra with greenfield access control. In a post on X, NHAI said, “The Union Cabinet has approved the construction of the 374 km 6-lane Greenfield Nashik-Solapur-Akkalkot Corridor, which is a major milestone in India’s high-speed national highway infrastructure.
The official, who suggested that the project will be submitted after 90% of the land is acquired, told the publication, “Land acquisition is at an advanced stage for the entire project.”
In his post at X, Prime Minister Narendra Modi said, “This transformational project, associated with Prime Minister Gati Shakti, will significantly reduce travel time, strengthen West-East connectivity, increase logistics costs and create large-scale employment.
Ashwini Vaishnaw said, “Travel time between Surat and Chennai will be reduced by 45% from the current 31 hours to 17 hours. This will ease heavy traffic between Surat, Vadodara and Mumbai towards Kurnool, Bengaluru and Chennai.” Apart from this, the Cabinet approved the widening and strengthening of NH-326 in Odisha.
