Due to hard rocks, difficult terrain, and lack of budget, only one kilometer of the Kumalgaun-Rupsa road in Narharinath Rural Municipality has been opened in two years.
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In the two years since the construction of the seven-kilometer road connecting Kumalgaun, the center of Narharinath Rural Municipality, to Rupsa, began, only 1 kilometer of track has been opened.
Karnali Employment, Chief Minister Employment and Municipality grants have made the road easy to access, but the rural municipality has started the work by contracting the locals to dig the difficult parts with tools like pickaxes, shovels and sabels.
The rural municipality is working by contracting from both sides.
Dozers have been breaking the cliff for two months. Rajendra Sahakari, the leader of Narharinath-5 Rupsa, said that he was not sure when it would be cleared as there were three kilometers of hard rocks. He said that he had to walk from Kumalgaun's cowshed to Rupsa via Adela.
Since it was not possible for local users to dig the road on hard rocks and steep land, the rural municipality awarded the contract six months ago by sharing the cost with the budget received from the federal supplementary fund. Nandamata Kiran JV has been awarded the contract worth Rs 20 million for the two-kilometer stretch from Kumalgaun's Gothi towards Adela.
Kamal Kumar Shah, the vice-chairman of the rural municipality, said that the work is being done by contracting from both the upstream and downstream sides to provide fast transportation to Rupsa. He said that Sadhbha SKT JV has been working on the rock for the past two months using a dozer from Rupsa up and another Rs 60 million down. According to him, the dozer brought down from Rupsa Lake via Mehelmudi is breaking the cliff from above downwards, while the dozer is also working upwards from Kumalgaun.
Complaining that it takes 5 hours to walk from Kumalgaun, the center of the rural municipality, to reach Rupsa, local Dhirendra Bogati said that once the road is built, the obligation of carrying heavy loads on one's back and walking will end. ‘The people’s representatives of the first term also sought votes saying that they would complete the road.’ The people’s representatives of the second term also made the road an election slogan,’ he said, ‘It is not yet certain when we will be able to drive.’
Village council chair Nagendra Bahadur Bista said that work is underway as per the contract to open the track of the road connecting the rural municipality’s center, Kumalgaun, to Rupsa within the next one year. ‘There is a plan to complete the road to all the settlements of the municipality within the next one year,’ he said, ‘The goal is to pave the road up to Kumalgaun.’
He said that despite writing to the Ministry of Home Affairs three times requesting explosives for the road connecting Rupsa, permission has not been received yet. ‘There is a situation where machines alone are not enough to break the mountain. It seems that blasting will have to be done,’ he said.
He said that a strategic road is also being constructed from Khulali in Kalikot to Lalu, Malkot, Kumalgaun, Kotwada, Sanni, Raskot, Nanikot and Laifu in Bajura. He said that once this road is built, it will be easier to put pressure on the Kotwada airport to operate.
Nirak Shah, an engineer of the rural municipality, said that it is difficult to work on the Kumalgaun-Rupsa road due to the hard rocks. ‘It has become difficult to reach the remote places,’ he said. ‘If the geography was easy, it could have been blacktopped with this much budget.’ He suggested that the government should change the development model in remote areas and allocate budget according to the location.
The construction of the road from Lalighat in the Karnali Corridor to Kumalgaun, the center of the rural municipality, was started in 2075, and the road track was opened within a year, but the upgrade has not yet been completed. The 31-kilometer road from Khulalu via Lalu to Malkot Ratimata is connected to the road network of wards 8, 9, 6 and 7, while the road track from Lalighat to Kotwada and Kumalgaun wards 1, 2 and 3 was opened 6 years ago, said Pradeep Bohora, spokesperson of the rural municipality. 'Development is a road. After the road is built, doors of other possibilities such as education, health, drinking water, employment will also open,' he said.
Narharinath rural municipality, which consists of the former Lalu, Malkot, Kotwada, Kumalgaun and Rupsa 5 VDCs, is a larger local level in terms of geography and population than other municipalities in the district. Narharihanath, with a total area of 143.86 square kilometers, has a population of 21,366.
Kali Bahadur Sahakari, a member of the House of Representatives from Narharihanath-5, Rupsa, said that the active participation of all the people's representatives and the community is necessary to bring the road to the village. He is a proportional representation MP elected from the Nepali Congress. He said that once the road reaches Rupsa, it will be easy to go to Ramaroshan in Achham from there. Ramaroshan can be reached on foot in 3 hours from Rupsa. If the vehicle starts running, it will take an hour. He said that once the road reaches Rupsa via Lalighat in Narharihanath, the distance for pilgrims going to Badimalika will also be reduced by one day.
