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The Centre has asked states to free National Highways from encroachments. The Transport Ministry has written a letter to state governments directing them to remove encroachments from such highways that fall in their territories. The letter states that the NHs were being encroached upon by food outlets and vegetable sellers, impacting free flow of traffic and leading to accidents. “Encroachment of NH land, whether of a permanent or temporary nature, is a matter of grave concern for traffic management and operations and future upgradation projects,� the letter noted. Officers of the National Highway Authority of India (NHAI) are empowered to take action against encroachments under the Control of National Highways (Land & Traffic) Act, 2002. Despite this, there is still a lot of encroachments on NH land, the letter added. The centre has also requested sensitising field units to prevent encroachments on National Highways and launch periodical drives to remove all sorts of encroachments from NH land. Recently, Minister of Road Transport and Highways Nitin Gadkari had spoken about poor road designs and the need to make safer highways by better planning. In line with this, the Transport Ministry has introduced mandatory training for highways Detailed Project Report Preparation (DPR) consultants. See also: Maharashtra to develop Pune-Nashik expressway Tenders floated to prepare Chennai’s Outer Ring Road