Nepal

IN A SHAMBLES

Painfully slow progress makes Mid-hill Highway an object of international shame

Construction started 15 years ago, but the national pride project has made only 64 per cent headway

Nepal Minute 06/12/2022 at 12:13 PM

https://www.nepalminute.com/uploads/posts/mid hill highway project office kavre1670310999.jpg — Prolonged delay has left the country's longest highway in a shambles. Photo: Mid-hill Highway Project

The Pushpalal (Mid-hill) Highway, Nepal's longest national highway, has made 64 per cent progress in one and a half decades since its construction began in 2064/65 BS (2007/2008).

The 1,879-km roadway starts at Chiyo Bhanjyang of Panchthar district in the east and ends at Jhulaghat of Baitadi in the far-west. As it passes through 26 hilly and mountainous districts connecting 215 settlements, an estimated 10 million people will benefit directly from the project upon completion.

Obstructions explained

The first deadline of this road project expired six years ago, but confusion remains over the road's alignment at several places.

Project Information Officer Suraj Adhikari said the road's alignment near the Budhigandaki High-dam Multipurpose Project site has been a contentious issue.

According to him, the highway was aligned initially along the Budhigandaki River in Gorkha district. However, the Ministry of Energy and Water Resources wrote to the project that it was planning to build the Budhigandaki High-dam Multipurpose Project at the site.

No sooner that issue was resolved, another confusion cropped up over the highway's alignment in Kaski. Adhikari explained that nearly 415 km of road and 25 bridges remain to be constructed under the Mid-hill Highway Project. Out of the remaining works, the contract for 205 km road and 19 bridges remains to be signed.

The highway project said the contract had to be signed for the black-topping of 357 km of the highway and the construction of 18 bridges and 134.5 km of road in the current fiscal year alone.

mid-hill highway project office kavre1670311011.jpg — The project has yet to sign a contract for black-topping of 357 km of the highway. Photo: Mid-hill Highway Project

The extended project deadline expires at the end of the current fiscal year, but it is unlikely that even the contracting process for the remaining works will be completed by that time.

The Council of Ministers has decided to realign a section of the highway in Kaski. Project Information Officer Adhikari said they had initiated the process for the road construction contract on the 38-km Bhainse-Jyamdu-Melbot-Panighat-Aantighar-Armalakot-Kalikhola Bridge-Amala Bisauni-Lamachaur-Jaubari-Yamdi Bridge section.

Adhikari said the Ministry of Energy had given the project the go-ahead for the highway construction in the Budhigandaki section as it would take another 7-8 years to build the Budhigandaki Reservoir Multi-purpose Project.

The highway project has initiated the process even in the sections for which the contract remains to be signed. Adhikari said the contract process had been forwarded for the construction works at Bahunepati of Sindhupalchok and in the Kaski section of the highway.

With RSS inputs

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