The Government of India has announced that it has cancelled the tender process to develop the Eastern Peripheral Expressway (National Highway No. NE-II) in the states of Haryana and Uttar Pradesh, India.

The project under public-private partnership (PPP) model has been cancelled due to it has failed to attract any developers. The National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) did not receive a single bid for the project before the April 4 deadline.

The toll road project was planned on a design, build, finance, operation and transfer (DBFOT) basis. The project cost was estimated at R62.900 million (US$1,046 million).

Reliance Infrastructure, IRB, Uniquest Infra Ventures, a Srei - OHL consortium and IL&FS had showed interest at the time of request for qualification (RFQ) stage but did not finally submit bids for the project. The bidding for the Eastern Peripheral Expressway project remained open for approximately 2 months but closed without anyone showing interest.

The project is now planned to be developed under the conventional engineering procurement construction (EPC) mode. The EPC process is likely to kick-start once the new government takes over. The Eastern Peripheral Expressway project starts at 36.083 on NH-1 and ends at km 64.330 on NH-2.