Due to the non-grant of multi-year resource consent, the new contract process for ongoing projects has not been able to proceed. Especially projects of national pride and strategic importance have not been able to obtain resource consent. The Mid-Hill, Hulaki and Madanbhandari highways are under the Department of Roads. The Koshi, Kaligandaki and Karnali Corridor roads are under the department. 

The Kathmandu-Terai/Madhes Fast Track has also been sent for resource consent. Shyam Bahadur Khadka, Deputy Director General and Spokesperson of the Department of Roads, said that except for one project, no resource consent has been obtained in the current fiscal year. ‘In the current fiscal year, projects other than the Nagam-Gamgadhi road have not received resource consent,’ he said. ‘If resource consent is not obtained in time, it becomes difficult to plan and proceed with the procurement process.’ The National Planning Commission has been sent for resource consent. Further process has not been able to proceed from there. 

Senior Divisional Engineer of the Water Resources and Irrigation Department, Premhari Parajuli, said that despite sending the National Planning Commission seeking resource consent for projects of national pride, no consent has been received so far. "We have sent the project for consulting for the Bheri Babai Diversion Multipurpose Project, and for other projects, we have requested consent for construction," he said. "The projects sent in this way have not been entered into the project bank, and resource consent has not been received either."

Parajuli said that a procurement master plan will be prepared and sent for resource consent, and if consent is not received in time, it will affect the award of new contracts. "If the agreement is not obtained now, this process will be postponed to the next fiscal year," he said. "If the resource agreement is not obtained on time in the next fiscal year, the impact on the entire project will be felt for a few years." The department has the Sunkoshi Marine Diversion Multipurpose Project, Babai Irrigation, Sikta Irrigation, Mahakali Irrigation, Rani Jamara Kulariya Irrigation and Bheri Babai Diversion Multipurpose Projects. The resource agreement files of all the projects have been deposited with the National Planning Commission.

The decision to grant multi-year resource agreement will be taken after the new government comes to power, said Prakash Kumar Shrestha, Vice Chairman of the National Planning Commission. "Almost all ministries have come for resource agreement, and work is currently underway to enter the projects in the project bank," he said. "Some decision will be taken on this after the new government is formed." Shrestha said that he is working on this so that the projects placed in the project bank will be easy in the future. More than a thousand projects worth more than Rs 30 million have been entered in the project bank. 

‘We will filter all the projects that are entered in the project bank and place them on the commission’s website soon,’ said Shrestha. ‘Projects placed in this way are suitable for budget allocation.’ He said that it will be easier for the Ministry of Finance to allocate budget based on this. Currently, the work of selecting projects that have come from various ministries for resource agreement is being done. 

Shrestha said that after projects that have come under political pressure are placed on the website and made public, there will be a public debate on whether they are needed or not. ‘Just because a project is placed in the project bank does not mean that budget will be received,’ he said. ‘There needs to be a public debate on how necessary the projects selected in the project bank are.’ 

Shrestha admitted that there is a delay in awarding new contracts due to not receiving multi-year resource agreement on time for ongoing large and prestigious projects. "But there are no contracts, it does not mean that work cannot be done," he said, "There are contracts worth 10 trillion from various bodies, the pace of work may be slow in some, there may be delays in payment after the construction work is completed, if all these contracts are to be completed on time, even the allocated capital budget in the current fiscal year is not enough." Currently, projects of national pride, especially new contracts, have become without them. The new process has not been able to move forward due to the lack of source consent while preparing for the contract. 

If the new government comes and extends the time for giving source consent, a decision on this will be made in the current fiscal year, he said. "It is only for projects under the federal government that the time for giving source consent has expired now," he said, "There is no problem at the provincial and local levels, work on such projects is underway there." 

Although the Ministry of Finance has implemented the multi-year project source consent standard-2082, it has not been implemented. This means that the construction of projects of national pride and strategic importance will be pushed back by a year. According to the criteria implemented on December 13, the concerned body had to submit the proposal for resource consent to the National Planning Commission by mid-December.