ABP LIVE India Infrastructure Conclave 2025: Nitin Gadkari, Minister of Road Transport and Highways of India said on Tuesday that he has worked towards building the road infrastructure in the country the way anyone would work towards building their own home.
Gadkari was speaking at the East Edition of the ABP LIVE India Infrastructure Conclave 2025. The conclave, organised by ABP Live in the national capital on January 28, 2025, to celebrate the progress of infrastructure in the eastern region, focusing on West Bengal, and bring together policymakers, industry leaders, and innovators to explore future growth opportunities.
Talking about the principle he followed while working for India, Gadkari said, “I worked towards building the road infrastructure of India following these four principles, ownership, teamwork, transparency and timebound decision-making process, which led to 7-word records and infrastructure development worth crores.”
He further added that the road infrastructure that we see today is thanks to all the engineers, contractors, and consultants who worked day and night along with him to make such a road network for the country and hence teamwork plays a very crucial role in the success of any project. “ I believe that human relationship is the biggest strength of politics, business and everything,” Gadkari opined.
“I had the privilege of working very closely with Atal Bihari Vajpayee and George Fernandes. I see both of them as my idols,” he added.
At the event, Gadkari also talked about how he does not hesitate to scold people working under him because the money spent on building roads is the common man’s money and these are big projects so everyone should put their best foot forward. He said that the people are getting paid to work so they should do their work properly and if there is any problem, they will also have to bear the repercussions.
He also discussed the challenges that they face while building road networks in the country, how he deals with difficult people, and what he plans to do with the people who do not deliver the quality of the work promised initially among many other things.
Additionally, ABP LIVE’s India Infrastructure Conclave 2025 also saw keynote speeches and engaging panel discussions focused on the evolving infrastructure landscape of the eastern region.
There were many other eminent speakers at the event including Harshvardhan Neotia, Chairman of Ambuja Neotia Group; Sudhendu Jyoti Sinha, Advisor at NITI Aayog; Saroj Kumar Pati, Former CEO of Capacit’e Infraprojects Limited; Abhishek Somany, CEO of SOMANY Ceramics; K. P. Mahadevaswamy, CMD of NBCC (India) Ltd.; Shri Anand Kumar, Chairman of RERA; Shivam Bajaj, Founder and CEO of Avener Capital; Pradeep Misra, CMD of Rudrabhishek Enterprises Ltd. (REPL); Paramasivan Srinivasan, MD of Afcons Infra Ltd.; and Raman Bhatia, MD and CEO of Servotech Power Systems.
