Walajah–Karaipettai Six-Lane Highway Upgrade Nears Completion, Full Stretch by 2026

According to the officials from the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI,) works on the six-lane upgrade of a stretch of the 36.08 km Chennai-Bangalore National Highway from Walajah to Karaipettai are about to be completed. The project is expected to be completed by September 2025.

Out of the entire highway work of 36.08 km, completion has been reached for 33.25 km, while 2.83 km remains to be completed and handed over in the next weeks. The project has a budget of ₹766.51 crore and started in 2018 but has suffered from various delays due to material shortages and later the pandemic lockdowns.

On the other hand, the addition of two more lanes on the six-lane widening of the 34 km stretch between Sriperumbudur and Karaipettai with several flyovers and bridges-16 in number- has been further delayed, and its completion is expected not earlier than October 2026. This was after re-awarding a new contractor in January 2025 to work on the Sriperumbudur-Karaipettai 18-km stretch by spending ₹411.16 crore after problems in execution earlier.

The entire stretch of 70 km between Sriperumbudur and Walajah is among the busiest segments of the Chennai-Bengaluru Highway, carrying about 75,000 passenger car units (PCUs) a day at a go. Officials remarked that the corridor has nearly 70 accident-prone black spots; therefore, widening and upgrading the same are crucial in alleviating congestion and improving safety.

Work on this project has faced several disruptions due to shortages of soil and fly ash, the two vital requirements in road construction. There were also problems in the supply of material as procurement from the NTPC’s Vallur plant, which was supposed to provide some amount of this, was disrupted. The problem was later solved through an auction, and the work resumed. After a break in construction, it started again in 2021 and was stopped at a laid-back pace until late 2023.

When completed, this six-lane upgradation is expected to drastically reduce the time it takes to travel from Chennai to Bangalore and also do some good for heavy freight traffic traveling through this industrial corridor. Safety features and smooth traffic management have been getting the utmost priority along the whole stretch, asserted NHAI.