NHAI announces winners of Green Highways Excellence Awards 2026; Details Inside
Babushahi Bureau/PIB
New Delhi, September 3, 2026: The National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) has announced the winners of the Green Highways Excellence Awards 2026, recognising outstanding practices in landscaping, plantation and green management along National Highway projects across the country.
The awards have been instituted to encourage sustainable plantation practices and promote excellence in the development and maintenance of green stretches along National Highways.
The awards were presented across three categories — Avenue Plantations, Median Plantations, and Plantation in Land Parcels, including clover leaves, interchanges, toll plazas and service areas.
Entries were invited from NHAI field offices, concessionaires, contractors, government agencies, NGOs and private agencies involved in plantation projects along National Highways.
Winners of Green Highways Excellence Awards 2026
Category I – Avenue Plantations
- First Prize: Six-Laning of Chilakaluripet Bypass on NH-16 in Andhra Pradesh, under RO-Vijayawada.
- Second Prize: Eight-Lane Vadodara-Kim Expressway, Padra to Vadodara section of the Vadodara-Mumbai Expressway in Gujarat, under RO-Gandhinagar.
- Third Prize: Gagariya-Bakhasar section of NH-925 and Satta-Gandhav section of NH-925A, under RO-Jaipur.
- Consolation Prize: Annual Maintenance including Incident Management of the Trichy-Karaikudi section of NH-210, NH-336, NH-36 and NH-536, including Trichy Bypass, under RO-Madurai.
Category II – Median Plantations
- First Prize: Four-Laning of the Hyderabad-Yadgiri section of NH-163, under RO-Hyderabad.
- Second Prize: Eight-Lane Vadodara-Kim Expressway, Sanpa to Padra section of the Vadodara-Mumbai Expressway in Gujarat, under RO-Gandhinagar.
- Third Prize: Varanasi Ring Road, Package-I, Harahua to Sandaha section of NH-31, under RO-UP East (Varanasi).
Category III – Plantation in Land Parcels
- First Prize: Jamtha Clover Leaf and Oxygen Bird Park on NH-44, under RO-Nagpur.
- Second Prize: Land parcels at Duhai Interchange under ToT Bundle-7, NE-II, covering monetisation of public-funded operational National Highway projects, under RO-Delhi.
- Third Prize: Miyawaki plantation in loop areas at the Lucknow-Ayodhya Road and Lucknow Outer Ring Road intersection junction, under RO-UP West (Lucknow).
86 Nominations Received Across Three Categories
NHAI received 86 nominations from across the country for this year’s awards. These included 27 nominations for Avenue Plantations, 36 for Median Plantations and 23 for Plantation in Land Parcels.
The entries were supported by geo-tagged photographs, drone videos, site-specific plantation plans and data on plantation survival rates.
Following the initial screening, 15 nominations — five from each category — were shortlisted for the final assessment. The evaluation framework gave the highest weightage to the survival rate of plantations. Other criteria included plantation action plans, timing of plantation activities, pit size, quality of planting material, protection measures, adherence to approved designs, species diversity, suitability and use of native species.
The assessment also focused on the quality, sustainability, effectiveness and potential for replicating successful practices across the National Highway network.
The Green Highways Excellence Awards were instituted in 2025 by NHAI in accordance with the Green Highways Policy, 2015. The initiative reflects NHAI’s efforts to integrate environmental sustainability with the expansion and development of India’s National Highway network.