A plane of the Indian Air Force (IAF), carrying Road Transport and Highways Minister Nitin Gadkari and Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, will conduct a mock emergency landing on a national highway in Rajasthan's Barmer this week, sources said on Monday.

Nitin Gadkari and Rajnath Singh will be inaugurating the 3.5 km-long strip on the national highway in Barmer this week as it is ready to handle emergency landings of the IAF's fighter jets and other aircraft, sources said, adding that “It is India's first national highway to be used for emergency landing of IAF aircraft.”, they added.

Notably, The Lucknow-Agra Expressway comes under the Uttar Pradesh government.  According to the sources, officials of the NHAI worked in coordination with IAF officials to develop the airstrip on the national highway in Barmer. They said at least a dozen national highways across the country are being readied so that they can be used as airstrips by the IAF planes in an emergency situation.

In October 2017, fighter jets and transport planes of the IAF had conducted mock landings on the Lucknow-Agra Expressway to show that such highways can be used by the IAF planes for landing in case of an emergency.

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