"In order to keep the national highways in patchless and traffic worthy condition, National Highway Authority of India (NHAI) has directed its Regional Officers (ROs) and Project Directors (PDs) to undertake maintenance of the National Highways on top priority-basis considering ensuing monsoon season," Ministry of Road Transport and Highways said in a statement.

To take up maintenance and repair work of national highways on a priority basis before monsoon, NHAI has issued policy guidelines to fast-track such work, the government said on Wednesday. All regional officers of NHAI have been delegated sufficient financial powers to take quick decisions regarding maintenance activities.

"In order to keep the national highways in patchless and traffic worthy condition, National Highway Authority of India (NHAI) has directed its Regional Officers (ROs) and Project Directors (PDs) to undertake maintenance of the National Highways on top priority-basis considering ensuing monsoon season," Ministry of Road Transport and Highways said in a statement.

The aim is to facilitate timely action and keep the highway stretches traffic-worthy ahead of the monsoon season i.e. latest by June 30, 2020, it added.

"NHAI has issued new policy guidelines to help its ROs/PDs plan and prioritize better; and then expedite the process of highway maintenance in the desired manner. The target is to ensure thorough planning of the requisite activities and the implementation of the same in a time bound manner," the statement said.

It said ROs of NHAI have been delegated sufficient financial powers to take quick decisions regarding maintenance activities, while PDs have been advised to make assessment of the condition of highways supported by technology driven tools through car mounted camera/ drone/ Network Survey Vehicle (NSV) etc for identification of various highway distress (like depression, rutting, cracking etc.) and plan rectification measures.

All field officers have been directed to adhere to the timelines, regularly monitor the progress of maintenance work and keep reporting the same to the authority at regular intervals.

The government said the NHAI headquarters will be monitoring the progress closely through its project management software - Data Lake where pictures of before and after repair works would be uploaded, apart from other repair related information.