The contractor lied, the road office believed him.
What you should know
What is the road like to the house of Sher Bahadur Deuba, who was elected from Dadeldhura for the seventh time and became the country's acting Prime Minister for the fifth time? Only after traveling about 10 kilometers from Bhatakanda on the Bhimdatta Highway to Matela in Ganyapadhura Rural Municipality-1, where Deuba was born, does one realize the plight of this road and the suffering that the locals are facing because of it.
Currently, work is being done on only 8 kilometers of the road up to Ruwakhola. Although four of the eight kilometers of the road are blacktopped, the rains a year ago have damaged it in places. The potholes are also the same.
Even after five years of the contract, four kilometers of the road in this section have not yet been blacktopped. The road is in disarray. If work had been continuous, four kilometers of the road could have been blacktopped within three years of the contract. Five years after the start of the work, the progress has reached about 50 percent. Jeeps, motorcyclists and passengers who travel on this road have to endure daily hardship. Stones and gravel piled up in places have increased the risk of accidents. Currently, there are no workers at the construction site. The excavator used in the construction is stranded on the road.
It has been 26 years since the track of this road was opened. But the blacktopping work has not been completed yet. Driver Tej Bahadur Deuba says that the condition of the road is making it difficult to drive the jeep. ‘It is even more difficult to drive on this road during the rainy season,’ he says. ‘The condition of the road to the village of a person who has been the Prime Minister five times is like this, it is even sadder to say this.’
Former Prime Minister Deuba has been voting from Asigram Secondary School in Ruwakhola, Ganyapadhura-1. Deuba often takes a helicopter to reach his village to vote. Since he rarely goes to the polling station by road, locals say that he has not been able to see the condition of the road leading to his village firsthand.
Local Man Bahadur Mahata said that all this happened due to the negligence of the contractor. ‘Deuba himself did not come and do the work,’ he said. ‘Even though he called the contractor in front of us and told him to do it, he did not do it.’ Although the Anak-Malika JV got the contract to blacktop the road, it has not completed the work yet.
Ward Chairman of Ganyapadhura Gapa-1 Naresh Bhandari said that the road has not been blacktopped yet due to the negligence of the contractor. ‘Every day, people have to suffer while traveling. This road becomes muddy during the rainy season. Sometimes vehicles get stuck, pedestrians slip and fall,’ he said, ‘more work has been done now than before.’
He said that the construction businessmen have been repeatedly urged by the Chief District Officer and the Road Division Office, Doti, to complete the work quickly. ‘The work that should have been completed in three years has not been completed even after five years,’ he said. Four jeeps carrying passengers ply this road daily. Motorcycles are always on the move. Locals are angry that even the road to Deuba’s village has not been built yet.
Ward Chairman Bhandari says that the delay in work was due to the contractor taking charge of the construction having contracts in many places and using fewer machines. ‘The work that needs to be done by mobilizing all the resources and means has not been done,’ he said, ‘there is still doubt that the work will be completed.’ He said that former Prime Minister Deuba’s secretariat is also being asked about the delay in the work.
The contract for the blacktop was worth 95 million rupees and the work is currently underway, said Ramesh Bhattarai, head of the Road Division Office, Doti. ‘The deadline has been extended twice. According to the contract signed in 2078, the work should be completed by Asad 2081,’ he said, ‘After the work was not completed, the deadline was extended until Asad 2082. After the work was not completed within that time, the time was extended until Mangsir 2082.’
But the work was not completed. The deadline is in the process of being extended again and the time may be extended until the end of 2082/83, according to the Road Division. Four km of the 8 km road up to Ruwakhola have been blacktopped. But the construction company that took the contract will have to repair the section damaged by the landslide that occurred in Asoj 081.
‘The geographical structure is also the same. The company that took the contract is now working saying that the work will be completed soon. The Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) was also not done on time,’ said Division Chief Bhattarai, ‘But now, if the work is not completed despite repeated extensions, action will be taken as per the rules.’ Director General of the Roads Department, Vijay Jaisi, said that if there is still no progress in the construction, there is no option but to terminate the contract.
Raghubir Saud of Anak-Malika JV said that the project could not work for two years because the trees were not removed and work is now being done after the trees are removed. ‘We are working. The workers have now gone home due to Maghi. The work that was stopped due to Maghi will start from Magh 5,’ he said. ‘The target is to complete the work by Chaitra.’ Even though there are two months left for Chaitra, the blacktop work has not started. Even the work of laying the base for that has not been done at the construction site.
A similar plight exists on the Bhimdatta Highway. It is 115 km from Attariya in Kailali to Dadeldhura headquarters. Most of the places are covered in potholes, broken blacktop, and the narrow roads have been made even narrower by piling up gravel and stones. Road repairs are finally underway in some places. Problems have been seen in more than a dozen places due to the collapse of the road. Currently, the Road Division Doti claims that repairs have been completed in some sections of the highway and are underway in others.
People who go to Dadeldhura via this highway are heard expressing anger, saying that the road to the home district of Deuba, who has been the Prime Minister five times, is in such a bad condition. Mahesh Dhami, a driver from Bajhang who has been driving a passenger microbus on this highway for 10 years, complains that there has been no significant improvement in the road.
