Parsa. The Birgunj Bachau Sangharsh Samiti has closed down shops on the main road section in protest against the road expansion from Gandak Chowk to Miteripul in Birgunj.
After the Supreme Court dismissed the writ petition against the road expansion, the Road Division Hetauda had written a letter on Chaitra 20 to demarcate the road in that section. The locals have been protesting since then. According to the committee, the markets in the main commercial areas of Birgunj will be closed until 12 noon.
Jawahar Prasad Gupta, coordinator of the Birgunj Defense Struggle Committee and ward chairman of Birgunj Metropolitan City-9, informed that the agitation was initiated after the Division Road Hetauda wrote a letter for the demarcation of the road without receiving the full text of the Supreme Court order. “We were forced to launch the protest after writing a letter for demarcation without receiving the full text of the decision,” he said. “The homeowners and businessmen here have come together to launch the protest program as they are trying to destroy the commercial area of historic Birgunj.”
He said that if the road is expanded, more than 1,100 homeowners from Gandak Bridge to Miteri Bridge will be displaced. “If this road is expanded, a situation will arise where 500 households out of 1,100 households will not have even a single inch of land,” he said. “There is no development work that will be done by making people squatters.” Maheshram Chaurasia of Birgunj Metropolitan City-6 complained that the road expansion will not leave even a single inch of land, including his four-story house. “The first road expansion has already taken up two and a half acres of land,” he said, “Now if we expand the road by 25-25 meters, not even a hand will be left.”
Sanjeev Sharma, who lives next to the Mahavir Temple in Birgunj, said that his family of five will be devastated if the road is expanded. Ward Chairman Gupta informed that a program has been scheduled to submit a memorandum to the District Administration Office along with a protest demonstration from Ardashnagar today. Guru Prasad Adhikari, Division Chief of Road Division, Hetauda, informed that before the Supreme Court’s full text comes, a letter has been sent to demarcate the area of 25/25 meters of the road boundary from Gandak Chowk-Power House-Ghantaghar-Birta-Rajat Jayanti Chowk-Miterhi Bridge under the Tribhuvan Highway.
On February 11, the Supreme Court had dismissed the writ petition against the expansion of the main road in Birgunj. A joint bench of Supreme Court Justices Binod Sharma and Mahesh Sharma Poudel dismissed all five writ petitions filed by the writ petitioners on Falgun 11, paving the way for the Division Road Office, Hetauda, to widen the road section of Birgunj by 25-25 meters on both sides.
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