It has been three years since the upgrading of the Nagdhunga-Naubise-Malekhu-Muglin road section began. Now, the work of removing electricity poles from the construction site is finally underway. Due to the failure to remove electricity poles on time, the progress of the Naubise-Malekhu and Malekhu-Muglin sections has not been able to increase.

The work has been stopped in the case of electricity poles. The problem of electricity poles and compensation due to contracting without preparation has not yet been resolved. The progress of the Nagdhunga-Muglin road, which is a 'lifeline' road connecting the capital, has slowed down when work should have been started without removing the electricity poles.

The project has been blaming the Electricity Authority and the Authority has been blaming the project concerned. Construction entrepreneurs say that the problem arose when the preparatory work was not completed in this section, where the upgrading was started with a concessional loan from the World Bank. 

The second-level blacktop has been completed in all sections except for 100 meters of the 12.26-kilometer section of the first section of the Nagdhunga-Naubise road where the upgrading has begun. Currently, blacktop work is also being done on 100 meters of Jhaplekhola.

Keshav Prasad Ojha, head of the eastern section of the Nagdhunga-Muglin road project, said that the construction work on the first section is nearing completion. The third-level blacktop is being done in the first section. The contract for the upgrade of the first section has been awarded to Jangsu-Sagun JV for Rs 1.3 billion. 

A disabled-friendly sky bridge for pedestrians is also being built at Khanikhola in this section. The contract for this section was signed on 29 Chaitra 2078. The work began only on 26 Jestha 2079, about a year and a half after the agreement. After the work was not completed by 27 Jestha 2081, the deadline was extended to Magh 2081, but the work was not completed. Again, after the time was extended to 10 Shrawan 2082, the deadline was extended to mid-Falgun. 

The electricity poles in the second section Naubise-Malekhu have not yet been removed. The distance of this section is 43.54 km. Before Asad, the first layer of blacktop was blacktopped on 15 km of the road. So far, 6 km of the section has been blacktopped with the second layer and one km of new blacktopped. In the Naubise-Mahadev Bensi and Adamghat-Malekhu sections, the work of moving the electricity poles is finally underway. 

The work of moving the poles has begun after Minister for Energy, Water Resources and Irrigation, Physical Infrastructure and Urban Development Kulman Ghising directed to mobilize sufficient manpower to remove the poles quickly and proceed with the construction work. 168 electricity poles are yet to be removed in this section.

‘The work of removing the electricity poles has already begun. When the poles were not removed, there was a problem in blacktop work. When gravel had to be laid, the work could not be done by placing rollers in the place due to the poles,’ Ojha said. ‘The construction contractor has to do the work twice that he could do at once.’ He said that the Electricity Authority itself was slow in moving the poles. 

‘The problem was that the same construction contractor was working on removing the poles across the country,’ Ojha said. ‘The authority has now been given money. The work of moving the poles has finally begun through the construction company it chose.’ He claims that the progress of the work will increase after the poles are removed.

Ojha also said that there were problems due to litigation in some sections. The construction of 9 out of 13 bridges has been completed. The overall progress is 49 percent. The contract for this has been taken by ZICG-Sharma-Lama JV for Rs 5.33 billion.9 million. The work of this section, which was awarded a contract on 14 Baisakh 2079, should have been completed by mid-Jeshta 2082, but the deadline has been extended to Asoj 2083 as it could not be completed.

Even after the initial contract for construction was completed, the work of moving the electricity poles has not been completed, said ZICG-Sharma-Lama JV Project Manager Gyanendra Ghimire. 'The work of moving the poles is being started, but now there is a problem with blacktopping the places where the poles are,' he said, 'This problem has arisen when the contract was awarded without doing the preparatory work.' He claims that it was easy and so much progress when Nepali construction entrepreneurs worked in a joint venture with a Chinese company. 

Nepal Electricity Authority spokesperson Rajan Dhakal says that problems arise because projects start work and ask to remove poles at the last minute. ‘There is a procedure for relocating electrical infrastructure. This applies to all projects,’ he said, ‘Only when a disaster strikes at the last minute is the authority said that it did not work. It should be decided during the survey of the project how many poles there are and for how long they will be moved, but this is not done.’ 

Dhakal said that the authority will move poles only after completing the process. ‘As per the procedure, we will sit down with both parties and estimate the cost, the concerned project deposits money in the name of the authority, we do not ask anyone to do the work for us,’ he said. He said that the moving of poles will begin only after a contract is called for and a construction company is selected. He said that problems also arise when the place for moving poles is not shown. 

Upgrading work is underway on the 94.66-kilometer road from Nagdhunga to Muglin. More than 12,000 vehicles ply on this road every day. Currently, the biggest problem is in the third section, Malekhu-Muglin. The progress of this section is very low. The road has been demolished everywhere in this section. There are many potholes. There is also not enough traffic police on the road, which leads to daily traffic jams. 

The distance of the third section is 38.86 km and the construction progress is only 36 percent. Sharma-ZICG has taken the contract for 4 billion 805.9 million rupees. According to the agreement signed on 15 Paush 2079, the work should be completed by 2082 Paush. After it was not completed, the deadline has been extended to 15 Ashad 083 as per the demand of the construction entrepreneurs. Sajna Adhikari, head of the Nagdhunga-Muglin Road Project, West Section, said that it is difficult to increase progress as the stock of construction materials has also run out. 

‘Although the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) was approved to extract construction materials from Lamabagar in Malekhu, it could not be removed due to opposition from the locals,’ the official said. ‘The target is to blacktop 20 km of roads in the current fiscal year, but it has been difficult to meet the target due to lack of construction materials.’

Another problem in this section is the relocation of electricity poles. Out of 136 poles, only 50 poles have been removed. As 86 poles have not been removed, the blacktop work has been stopped as poles have not been moved at the mouth of Muglin, Malekhu Bazaar and Mauwakhola bridges. So far, only the Fisling-Chumlingtar section has been removed. He alleges that despite repeated requests to the Electricity Authority to remove them, they have delayed their removal.