Arun Lakhani’s Vision and Mission for VIL Vishvaraj Infrastructure Ltd. (VIL India) specializes in three Infrastructure sectors – Water, Waste Water and Transportation.Arun lakhani is of the view that VIL has been pioneering innovative PPP models in water infrastructure sector. VIL philosophy of creating value by removal of inefficiencies and ensuring win-win for all the stakeholders is in tune with the social nature of water projects. Understanding and focus on implementation details and awareness of last mile problems and their mitigation is strength of VIL to create value by removing inefficiencies from the system. India has vast requirement of Infrastructure building and improvement. The PPP route was established in last decade also saw some lean time. With New government initiative the PPP has again come with better risk sharing matrix between private and public. VIL has been a proponent of PPP model, and has established track record in Road and highways sector. With Urban Infrastructure foray in Water, it is today the only Indian Utility with ongoing projects in Water distribution as well as Waste water treatment and Reuse. With Water scarcity hitting the country in a big way, with sustainability point of view, VIL’s example of Total Integrated water management at Nagpur is being followed by the whole nation. Treating Sewage as Water Source and reuse for commercial/industrial purpose is key to releasing fresh water used by Industry for drinking, without augmenting fresh sources. Govt. also realized the rational, and is supporting with policies promoting treated water use after the successful endeavor of Nagpur. This has opened gates for USD 45bn+ drinking water and USD 25 bn+ sewage and reuse market for Private participation in India. Large Programs like Namami Gange ( Ganga Cleaning) is based on Hybrid Annuity PPP model. The business divisions that VIL ventured out are as follows: Water: The rapidly urbanizing Indian population is expected to reach a figure close to 600 million urban people by 2031. This massive transition is creating serious challenges for urban planners and ULBs, especially which of ensuring quality water supply to these citizens. Indian cities have for long lived with intermittent water supply systems riddled with a variety of problems ranging from high levels of NRW to contamination issues. Waste Water Reuse: Amongst the challenges thrown up by increased urbanization in India one of the bigger ones is massive increase in wastewater generation. The Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB) estimates that about 80 percent of the water supplied for domestic use is
discharged as wastewater. This pollutes the downstream areas as it enters untreated into these water bodies. Around 38,250 MLD of wastewater is generated by class I and class II cities in India, which is estimated to grow 3.5 times to 132,250 MLD by 2050. The current wastewater treatment capacity can handle only 30 percent of the total generation, out of which too only 55 percent is operational. This translates to an investment gap of over USD 7 Billion for class I and class II cities by 2016-17. Transport Roads, the predominant mode of transportation in India carry almost 80 percent of the country’s passenger traffic and 65 percent of its freight. With a density of 0.66 km of highway per square kilometer of land India’s highway network is similar to that of the United States (0.65) and much greater than China’s (0.16) or Brazil’s (0.20). India boasts of 3.3 million Kms of highways, with 80,000 Kms of National highways and 1, 31,000 Kms of State highways. Indian roads experienced a 10.16% CAGR of growth of vehicles in the last five years.