Although the contract for the Suryabinayak-Dhulikhel road expansion and bridge construction was awarded in the same year, the construction of the two bridges has not yet begun. While the road expansion work is half complete, construction of only one bridge has begun, and its progress is a very low 10 percent.

The distance of the road that has been expanded to four lanes is 15.8 kilometers, which has been divided into two sections and contracted. Separate contracts have been awarded for three bridges. The contract for them has been awarded to Himdung & Thokar-Ramjanaki JV. Himdung & Thokar company belongs to Congress leader and former Chief Minister of Bagmati Province Bahadur Singh Lama. However, progress on the contract awarded by his company is low.

The project engineer Vivek Pandey said that the contract for the three bridges was awarded in a single package. ‘The contract for this has been awarded under the design and build technique,’ Pandey said, ‘That is why its design is also done by the construction contractor. He also does the work.’ According to the agreement signed on 6 Chaitra 2079, the work should be completed by 5 Asoj 2082. As the design has not been finalized yet, the work has not been able to gain momentum. The contract for the three bridges was awarded for Rs 575 million including VAT. However, the deadline has been extended by one year after the work was not completed as per the agreement.

The project says that since it is a small bridge, the construction contractors will work diligently and complete it within the extended time. According to the traffic police, more than 10,000 small and large vehicles ply this road every day. However, there is no progress in the construction of the bridge on this road. The project has been blaming the construction contractors and the construction contractors for the delay. Minister for Energy, Water Resources and Irrigation, Physical Infrastructure and Transport and Urban Development Kulman Ghising has monitored this road twice.

Concerned about the delay in the construction of the bridge, Ghising has directed to hold discussions with the project chief, the Director General of the Road Department, and the construction contractors to complete the construction quickly. One bridge under the road falls in Bhaktapur and two in Kavre. Jagati Bridge in Bhaktapur, Punyamata and Mahadev Khola Bridge fall in Kavre.

The demand of the locals in Jagati was that the bridge should be made straight, and since the river is steep, it was designed accordingly. The project says that the locals opposed the project and did not allow it to be built according to the original design. “After there were problems with the original design of the Jagati bridge, the construction contractor is redesigning it. It will be submitted to the Road Department soon and approved,” said Engineer Pandey. “The locals said that the height of the bridge in the Punyamata Khola bridge was too high in the previous design. Later, they asked to reduce the height, so the redesign was submitted to the Road Department.”

Work is underway on the Mahadev Khola bridge and its progress is only 10 percent. “The design of the Punyamata bridge will be approved within the next 8/9 days, and the construction contractor is preparing to submit the design of the Jagati bridge within a week,” he said. Nirmal Sitaula, director of Himdung & Thokar, one of the companies that took the contract for the bridge, said that the work could not be done on time due to the delay in getting the design approved by the Road Department.

‘This is a design and build contract, after we submit the design, the Road Department will approve it, the detailed design should be submitted within 6 months and then the design should be approved within three months,’ Sitaula said, ‘But it took 18 months to get the design approved for a 30-month project.’ Although there was a lot of delay in approving the design from the Road Department in the beginning, Sitaula says that now after Kulman Ghising became the minister, interest has started to show.

‘Last October, when the locals came to the Jagati Khola bridge, they were asked to redesign it,’ Sitaula said, ‘It would have been better if they had looked at the design quickly and allowed the work to begin, now that the minister came and asked why there was a delay, the project has shown interest, and finally the department has started looking at it properly.’ He said that the design of the Punyamata Khola bridge was approved by the Road Department within a week and there was no problem in starting the work. ‘The minister has shown interest in the project work. If the problems that arise are resolved, there will be no problem in building the bridge,’ he said.

The construction of the bridge has been delayed due to obstruction by locals, design changes and construction contractors, said Bijay Kumar Mahato, head of the Suryabinayak-Dhulikhel road project. ‘The locals did not allow the work to be done as per the original design of the holy mother, later the design had to be redesigned, which is why there was a delay,’ Mahato said, ‘There are four ward offices located nearby in Jagati, the work was not allowed to be done from those ward offices as per the original design, the design has been sent for approval again after getting the agreement from the ward.’ He claims that the construction contractors have delayed the work even after showing it to the locals.

The work on the road expansion is also slow. As the initial deadline is about to expire, the overall construction progress is only 50 percent. It has been divided into two sections and contracted. The first section is Suryabinayak-Sanga. The distance of this section is 7.5 km. The contract for that section was won by Ashish-Kumar Shrestha-Bandhan Bhagwati JV on 24 Paush 2079. Its contract amount is 3 billion 889 million rupees. The progress of this section is 42 percent and the deadline is only until December 27. As the deadline is about to expire, the progress of this section has not even reached 50 percent. Finally, the blacktop is being done.