New Delhi: On May 27 last year, Prime Minister Narendra Modi held a grand roadshow to ‘inaugurate’ the Delhi-Meerut expressway, just a day prior to a by-poll in western Uttar Pradesh’s Kairana. It was 69% incomplete at the time, as The Wire had reported.Now, one year after its ‘inauguration’, the 82-kilometre expressway is still 34% incomplete, according to the National Highway Authority of India. The only phase of the four-phase project that is fully complete is still phase 1, which starts and ends in Delhi. This was the phase that Modi inaugurated last year.The other three phases – UP border to Dasana, Dasana to Hapur and the greenfield phase from Dasana to Meerut – remain incomplete, like last year. But, progress has been made in all the three phases, with a total road of around 28 kilometres having been constructed in the one-year period.“51% of phase 2 has been completed. While 92% of phase 3 is ready and 47% of the greenfield phase 4 is complete,” said R.P. Singh, project director at the National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) in charge of the Rs 7,5000 crore Delhi-Meerut expressway project.A majority of the expressway that has been constructed is part of phase 1 to 3, which includes lane expansions and service lane building. Phase 4, the only greenfield – and longest – phase of the expressway, lags behind, as it did last year. Approximately 17 of the 31 kilometres in phase 4 are yet to be constructed.The project has missed a number of deadlines. Initially, the NHAI’s deadline for the project was March 2018 and it was subsequently extended to December 2018. Union road transport minister Nitin Gadkari pushed it further to March 2019.The latest deadline for the project, according to the NHAI, is May 2020. “We will try and finish the project before May 2020. But, officially that is the deadline we have set,” said Singh.The foundation stone for the Delhi-Meerut expressway was laid by Modi in December 2015. “We are not merely constructing a road, this is a highway to development,” Modi said, arguing that the expressway will spur growth and employment in western UP.Also Read: Cracks Appear on Delhi-Meerut Expressway Two Months After Modi Inaugurated ItThe project is supposed to cut down travel time between Delhi and Meerut to an hour. Currently, on the congested and pothole-ridden four lane national highway 34, it can take up to five hours.The expressway’s delay is due to hurdles in the land acquisition process. In Ghaziabad district, several residents disputed the compensation that they had received. According to a district official in Ghaziabad, all disputes have now been settled through an arbitration process.Irregularities were also found in the land acquisition process. Officials have been accused of buying land from farmers at low prices knowing that the land will be acquired and then selling it to the government at a higher price. Land was purchased from farmers between Rs 1,700 and Rs 1,800 per square meter and sold to the state government between Rs 7,000 and Rs 8,000 per square meter. The case is now being investigated by the UP government.In all, according to response to a Right to Information (RTI) query filed by The Wire, 469 hectares of land has been acquired for the project – five hectares for phase 3 and 464 hectares for the greenfield phase 4.