It has been a decade and a half since the Ministry of Urban Development declared a new city. Neither the cities announced so far are nearing completion, nor is there any progress. The number of cities where the declaration was started from 10 has now been increased to 54. So far, the work of all the cities is in the initial stage.

The budget and manpower are not enough to carry out the work . The work of the city has been carried forward with limited manpower. Ekraj Adhikari, the Project Director of the New City Project Coordination Office, says that the work of 10 cities has been advanced after a good study. 

In the year 067/68, the construction of a new city has been started by choosing two cities from each development area, he said, how is the population growth there? The city was selected based on whether the geography is suitable for the expansion of the city.''

'The goal was to plan for one/two years and then build infrastructure for one to one lakh people within 20 years,' he said, 'At that time, the city was chosen in accordance with the idea of ​​developing and building new cities in the Madhyapahari region.' Meanwhile, the question arose as to why the city should be built only in the Madhyapahari and not elsewhere. MPs and ministers raised these issues. They started pressing to add cities to their respective districts.  When

is made in the middle of the mountains, questions started to arise saying why not make it in the plains and in the mountains. After that, cities started to be added one after the other . The number of cities increased from 10 to 54 when including all regions and geography. According to the project, achievements have not been achieved by dividing the same resource into several cities. 

In order to prevent unorganized urbanization caused by the pressure of migration from mid-hill area to big cities and Terai region, the project director officer said that a new city project has been started covering the settlements around the meeting point of the mid-hill highway and the north-south connecting corridor road. 

In the beginning, it was estimated that it would cost 3.5 trillion in 20 years to build 10 cities. So far, more than 8 billion has been spent in 10 cities. "Building a new city is not that easy," he said, "Budget is important in construction, but there is no budget according to that." Initially, 10 cities under the Madhyapahari highway are Fidim (Panchathar), Basantpur (Tehrathum), Khurkot (Sindhuli), Baireni-Galchi (Dhading), Dumre-Bhansar (Tanahun), Burtibang (Baglung), Chaurjahari (Rukum), Rakam-Karnali. (Dailekh), Sanfebagar (Achham), Patan (Baitadi) are . The number of two cities on this route was added later. According to which Veriganga (Surkhet) and Bhingri (Pyuthan) were added. 

According to the 2078 census, negative population growth was seen in the districts of the Madhyapahari highway where the new city was implemented, said the project director officer. "In such a situation, the challenge of how to sustain the population in a new city has been added," he said.

'There are also managerial deficiencies in the new city, there is also the problem of employees not wanting to go to small projects,' said a project source, 'because of this, the Ministry of Urban Development has failed to manage it institutionally.' On the other hand, the official says that the new city project is less within the budget priorities. 

"According to the manner in which new cities were announced, cities were not prioritized in recent times," says the official, "Even though the available resources have been distributed among 10 cities, the results have not been visible yet." The postal highways include Gauriganj (Jhapa), Rangeli (Morang), Manra (Mahottari), Brahmapuri (Sarlahi), Maulapur (Rautahat), Mahagadhimai (Bara), Bardghat (Nawalparasi), Rajapur (Bardia), Bhajani (Kailali) and Belauri (Kanchanpur). Similarly, the settlements on the Himalayan footpath are Lukla (Solukhumbu), Phungling (Taplejung), Kimathanka (Sankhuwasabha), Syafrubensi (Rasuwa), Jomsom (Mustang), Chame (Manang), Simkot (Humla), Martadi (Bajura) and Kolti (Bajura). 

"The city building process is never complete," said the official, "It is a continuous process". Lumbini (Roopandehi), Nijgarh (Bara), Palungtar (Gorkha), Dhankuta (Dhankuta), Mirchaiya (Sirha), Chandrapur (Rautahat), Kavre (Kavre), Bharatpur (Chitwan), Waling (Syangja), Tulsipur (Dang), Dullu (Dailekh), Tikapur (Kailali), Amargarhi (Ddeldhura), Gundu (Bhaktapur), Bhimdatta (Mahendranagar), Gauriganj (Jhapa) and Maulapur (Rautahat) are . 

"Government has created a master plan for the cities that have been kept in the budget and policies and programs," said the project director officer, "not much work has been done in terms of budget and resources." He says that there is a demand for roads and sewerage in most of the smart cities. "Information technology should be connected with infrastructure services in smart city, that kind of demand is not coming," he said, "We are working slowly, we also have some technical deficiencies, so smart city has not been able to work as intended." 

The main purpose of starting new city construction is to organize urbanization and develop each city as the economic center of that region, to prepare settlement development plans, land use and development strategies. 

Similarly, by developing and promoting agricultural, tourism, educational, cultural and industrial infrastructures, economic activities are made active and competitive. The new city project aims to minimize migration to large urban areas, Terai and agricultural areas while developing small and medium modern cities. 

"Now we are focusing on the cities that were announced at the beginning. At the beginning, the budget was scattered. For the past three financial years, we have been allocating 70 percent of the budget for the 10 old cities under the new cities," the official said, "The first city was studied for a long time because it was necessary, so its construction has been started accordingly." 

The budget for the new city started coming only from 070/71 . The project claims that the work has been delayed due to only preparatory work. No city has been completed yet . "Addition of the city was done along Hachuwaka, if we could have concentrated on the old city from the beginning, it would not have been a problem," says the project source, "so far, some progress was seen, but 12 billion has been spent so far, only 8 billion has been spent on the cities announced at the beginning." 

So far, the land consolidation work of Fidim has been completed . In January of the previous year, the decision to acquire the land of Chaurjahari in Rukum and Khurkot in Sindhuli is being worked on. Now it has been decided to acquire the land of Vasantpur in Terhathum and Sanfebagar in Achham. The official said that the land of Baireni-Galchi in Dhading and Dumre-Bansar in Tanahun has been submitted to the Council of Ministers. "Planned settlements should be developed where the new city is implemented," he said.

531.38 km out of 5 thousand 734.96 km of track opening work under the new city, 95.45 km out of 897.57 km of road paving has been done . Similarly, 60.83 km out of 512.36 km of sloped roads, 298.65 km out of 1333.57 km of sewers and drains have been constructed. 37 out of 264 government buildings, 12 out of 141 vegetable, fruit and hot markets have been constructed.

7 out of 34 bus parks, 10 out of 125 playgrounds, 16 out of 184 parks, 11 out of 12 water supply projects have been completed. The project stated that the construction of 2 out of 10 landfill sites has been completed.

The 59th annual report of the Auditor General has pointed out that the project works are incomplete for years and the expected returns are not achieved due to the trend of adding new cities while the projects are not completed . "New programs should be conducted only after the projects that have been started are completed," the report said. Since the new city was declared for political interests, the progress is low due to lack of sufficient budget. 

A new city project was launched with the aim of providing modern services and infrastructure. In the beginning, according to the desire of the Minister of Urban Development, the city was added to his district. "When Prabhu Shah was the minister, the name of a new city was added to the budget saying that if there is a new city on the Madhyapahari highway, then why can't a city be placed on the postal highway," Urban Development Ministry sources say.

'We don't know how many years it will take to complete this by allocating a small budget,' says the chief officer of the project, 'wherever there is a possibility, we should be guided in organizing more.' Another problem is that of manpower. 

'Now we have worked by managing the general manpower in the office,' he said, 'there are 12 senior divisional engineer positions including the 11 district office and the coordination office at the center, but now there is only one CDE in the coordination office.' "In addition to the 10 cities announced at the beginning, there are 11 offices including Veriganga in Surkhet," he said.

'The work of a new city will be done by developing the land,' said the official, 'We will work to protect and improve it in such a way as to reflect its originality.' "The new city will take people's land and make plans on their land. Locals should contribute land for roads and open areas," he said, "later it will be returned to them."

With the aim of stopping internal migration, the construction of 10 new cities was selected and started by former secretary Maniram Gelal. "The concept of a new city was started by looking at 10 places on the Madhyapahari highway and targeting a population of one lakh," he said.

Although money is not required for land consolidation, he says that it is needed for other infrastructure. "The number of cities was increased while resources were running low, it was difficult to find people to go to new cities to work," said Gelal, a former secretary who retired from the Ministry of Urban Development. From

, another former secretary Madhusudan Adhikari says that initially after studying 10 cities well, the work was started, but later the work was done to appease the people of Hachuwa. "The budget comes within the new city program, which became a separate title, so when the leadership of the ministry changes, there is a rush to move the budget to their district," he said, "which is why the name of the city was forcibly added to the budget to please the voters without doing a pre-feasibility study."