Union Minister for Road Transport, Highways and Shipping Nitin Gadkari has asserted that he is continuously striving for overall development of Nagpur and other districts of Vidarbha region along with different parts of Maharashtra state. <br/><br/>He was speaking at the 'Meet-the-Press' programme organized by the Nagpur Union of Working Journalists in Nagpur on Saturday.<br/><br/>Mentioning that the Union Government has sanctioned total financial assistance of 17,399 crore rupees for various projects in Nagpur city and district, he said that it includes 8,860 crore rupees for Metro Railway, 7,125 crore rupees for the development of National Highways and other important roads, 1,577 crore rupees for establishment of All India Institute of Medical Sciences, ten crore rupees for Deekshabhoomi and seven crore rupees for improvement of accident-prone black spots in the vicinity. <br/><br/>Mr Gadkari informed that the total length of National Highways in the state was 5,560 kilometres when the National Democratic Alliance Government came to power at the Centre in 2014. It has gone up significantly to 21, 559 kilometres now with the sanction of additional projects involving 15, 899 kilometres during the last two years. Similarly, the state has got record allocation of 5,600 crore rupees from the Central Road Fund for the first time, he said.<br/><br/>In order to ensure time-bound completion of National Irrigation Projects in different parts of the country, the Centre has provided for one lakh crore rupees including 80,000 crore rupees under the Accelerated Irrigation Benefit Programme and 20,000 crore rupees under the Prime Minister's Krishi Sinchai Yojana. <br/><br/>Out of the total 89 projects, Maharashtra has got 28 projects including Gosekhurd in Vidarbha region listed in the scheme. An important meeting would be held in Mumbai next week along with the Water Resources Minister and Chief Minister to sort out the pending issues, he added.