Why GatiShakti is Patelian idea

Sardar Vallabhbhai Patel promoted the idea that coordinated infrastructure building advances the cause of national unity. He would have seen merit in GatiShakti.

In barely about eight months in 1947-48, Sardar Vallabhai Patel, the first deputy prime minister of Independent India, prepared for a winter he knew was coming in Kashmir. Ever prescient, Patel led construction of telecommunication links between Srinagar and Delhi on a war-footing.

It was he who pushed through the building of the Jammu-Pathankot road for which 70 special trains were pressed to service and a labour force of 40,000 worked round-the-clock to construct the around 90-kilometre road with 17-kilometre of bridges and culverts.