On the morning of November 20, Anil Agrawal, who was running a clothing store in the main market of Hetauda, ​​was destroyed when a dozer was driven into the Jhismise area.

Agrawal, who had been trading clothes for eight and a half decades, not only collapsed, but the shop and the family had to be displaced.

Agrawal, who has been running a clothes shop since his father's time, is now running a shop on the second floor of a house located on the side of Kanti Lokpath, Hetauda Sub-metropolitan City-4.

Agrawal's grandfather Sohanlal had started a clothes shop in a shack near the current Buddha Chowk in 1997. The business flourished. Anil's father Ishwar Chandra demolished the shack, made it concrete and started running a 'magnificent' clothes shop there. Everyone in Hetauda knew his shop by the name of 'Tinpuste Agrawal's Cloth Shop'.

Anil did business in the same house until the evening of Mangsir 19. Even when he closed the shop and left, he did not think that today's business would be the last business to be done from this house. It happened like this. The dozer started working on Saturday. The goods were destroyed in no time. He said, ‘Before I could wake up in the morning, the dozer started working. What happened in a moment? I couldn’t even think about what to do now.’

Not only Anil Agrawal, but Dil Bahadur Shrestha, who has been running a grocery shop in Hetauda Bazaar for six decades, was also displaced from the morning of November 20. He is currently operating a shop on rent at Parijat Road, Hetauda Sub-Metropolitan City-4. His old shop was around Hetauda Bazaar.

During the road expansion in Hetauda Bazaar area, the Division Road Office demolished the structure on the 20th of last month, saying that a house had been built encroaching on the road boundary. Due to this, not only Anil Agrawal and Dil Bahadur Shrestha, but more than 700 shopkeepers were displaced.

Most of the shopkeepers are continuing their business by renting rooms on the inner streets of Hetauda Bazaar. Some traders are selling the contents of the demolished houses on the roadside. Some want to sell the goods of their shops on a 'second hand' basis and bid farewell to their ancestral profession forever.

Two large hotels including lodges in the main market area of ​​Hetauda have also been demolished during the road expansion. The oldest hotels in Hetauda, ​​Neelam Lodge and Seema Hotel and Lodge, were demolished on the grounds that they were built in violation of the road boundary.

With the demolition of the houses, the vacant shutters and rooms on the inner streets of Hetauda are now filled. The number of people looking for shutters and rooms has increased. The buildings that were empty until November 20 have suddenly started filling up after the structures of the main market collapsed.

Unsettled market

It has been 19 days since the houses in the market were demolished. Road Division Office Hetauda remains silent after house demolition. The main market area of ​​Hetauda is now in chaos after the office demolished the house. Debris is scattered. Wires are down. Some electricity poles have fallen, some are bent. There is darkness in the main market due to lack of electricity supply. The risk has also increased.

After the front part of the house was demolished with a dozer, people who own land and houses behind it are demolishing the structure themselves. Five workers have been injured so far during the demolition.

After the victims filed a case in the Supreme Court, the process of summoning both parties has begun. But sometimes the judge's bench cannot be seen, sometimes the case has been delayed due to lack of time. The Supreme Court has fixed the hearing for Poush 13.

The Road Division Office Hetauda has remained silent until the case is resolved. According to the office, the road expansion and management work could not be carried out due to legal complications.

Road Division Chief Guru Prasad Adhikari said that the office was forced to ‘stay with its hands tied’ until the Supreme Court orders. He said that even though we tried to help the injured workers on humanitarian grounds, there were legal obstacles.

‘Right now, we are not in a position to use machines not only for road expansion work, but also for damaged structures,’ he said. ‘Even if someone asks for a machine in an emergency, there is no legal situation to send it. We are waiting for the Supreme Court’s order.’

There had been a long-standing dispute over the removal of structures on the right and left sides of the road. After the information was made public that ‘structures built encroaching on the road’ would be demolished in the Hetauda market area, a writ was filed in the Supreme Court against it on 16 December. Hearing the writ petition on 19th Mangsir, the Supreme Court issued a short-term interim order saying, "The status quo should be maintained without implementing the notice or making it stay as it is" and called both the parties for discussion on 26th Mangsir. The Division Road Office demolished the structure saying that it had not listened to the court order and that the letter had not been received.

The Road Department, local administration and victims of house demolition have demanded that the Hetauda road expansion case be put on the priority list and be quickly disposed of.

The Road Division Office, Hetauda, ​​demolished about 500 houses from Ratomate to the popular hotel in Chowkitol and from Buddha Chowk to the District Police Office in the early hours of 20th Mangsir.

Most of the demolished houses have houses elsewhere and some have already built new buildings behind the demolished houses.

Hetauda, ​​which began to be inhabited after 2011, developed into a major city of the country for 71 years. Hetauda, ​​which was the headquarters of the then Central Region, is now the capital of Bagmati Province.