Bhubaneswar: Chief minister Naveen Patnaik on Saturday asked senior forest officials to expedite forest and environmental clearance for infrastructure projects.

"These clearances should be fast-tracked, so that the initiatives are not delayed," said Naveen while addressing the conference of the divisional forest officers at the state secretariat.

The advice assumes significance in the backdrop of allegation of forest clearance having not been given to the second Brahmani bridge.

Union road transport minister Nitin Gadkari had recently said in a letter to the chief minister that the project was being delayed due to want of forest clearance. However, the state's parliamentary affairs minister Bikram Keshari Arukh had told the Assembly in the first week of this month that it was not needed for the bridge since the site did not come under forest land.

Later, National Highways Authority of India member Anand Kumar Singh met the chief secretary and other senior officials and maintained that the work would begin only after the project received the required approval.

"We have requested the Odisha government to give all the clearance as soon as possible. Forest clearance is first and bridge building work is the next step. We will soon complete the project after all the clearance is obtained. We will go one after another tender," Singh had told the reporters after the meeting with the state government officials.

Naveen also stressed the need to protect and manage wildlife habitat to reduce man-aninal conflicts. "Our government has increased the compassionate amount for the human loss of life from Rs 3 lakh to Rs 4 lakh. The amount should be paid in the field within the time frame, so that people should bot suffer under any circumstances," he said.