(This story originally appeared in on Jun 12, 2018)

The increased pace of highway construction has more than doubled employment generation in the past four years, according to an estimate by the road transport ministry While during 2013-14, only 45,600 man-days of jobs were generated due to highway construction it increased to about 1.1 lakh during last fiscal year.Moreover, the central guidelines for growth of taxi aggregators has created direct job opportunities for over a million drivers with each driver’s take home pegged around Rs 20,000 to Rs 30,000 per month. Even the decision of no permit norm for e-rickshaws have also generated new employment to lakhs of people across the country.In its report on the initiative taken by the ministry, which have benefited the common man and especially middle classes, the ministry has listed the steps that have improved the “ease of living”. It has mentioned how highway construction touched 9,830 km during 2017-18 in comparison to only 4,260 in 2013-14 when the Narendra Modi government came to power.