Kavrepalanchok. Work has been stalled in the Pulbazar area of the Sanga-Dhulikhel road section under the Araniko Highway, which is being upgraded, due to obstruction by locals. The Department of Roads’ Suryabinayak-Dhulikhel, Dhulikhel-Sindhuli-Bardibas Road Project has stated that the expansion of about 200 meters of the area has been stopped for one and a half months.
The expansion has been stopped for one and a half months after locals raised obstructions regarding the issue of the ‘center line’ in the Pulbazar area of the road section under construction. It is said that work is being done on 140 feet out of 75/75 feet 9150 feet from the center line, and the locals have blocked the construction, demanding equal separation for the houses on both sides.
‘We should separate the houses equally from the middle of the road as per the design of the road, but the locals created a dispute saying that the distance between the houses should be equal, so the construction work was stopped,’ said project engineer Bishnu Khanal. According to him, although efforts were made to remove the obstacles in coordination with various bodies earlier, discussions between the people’s representatives of Banepa Municipality and locals on Tuesday also ended without any conclusion.
Construction has also been stopped in the main city area of Banepa due to obstacles in the Pul Bazaar area. According to Engineer Khanal, although the construction of a road of about one km from Chandeshwari Khola to Banepa Chardobato on the eastern side of the city is underway, other work has come to a standstill.
Khanal said that if the obstructions in the Pulbazar area are not removed immediately and the expansion work is not carried out, the work will not be able to continue before the rainy season. He said that work is progressing rapidly in other places. According to him, as the work is gaining momentum in the Dhulikhel area, preparations are being made to blacktop the road within a few days after completing the work of walls, drains, and pavements in a one-km area.
In the Pulbazar area, it is said that the work of removing houses and huts within the standards, extending electricity poles, optical fiber, and removing high-tension poles has been stopped due to the obstacles of the locals. According to the project, nine houses and huts will have to be removed under the Sanga-Dhulikhel road section, including two in Nasikasthan, three in Bhainsipati, two in Janagaal, one in Budol, and one in 28 Kilo.
Similarly, 70 percent of the work of moving electricity poles is still pending, and the work of moving high-tension poles at one place is still pending. The project last issued a public notice on March 10 requesting the demolition of houses, huts and other structures that fall within the parameters of the Suryabinayak-Dhulikhel road section being expanded.
Earlier, various problems were seen in the 28 Kilo, Budol, Banepa and Pulbazar areas, including the need to remove houses and huts due to repeated obstacles from locals.
Meanwhile, the expansion of the road from Suryabinayak in Bhaktapur to Dhulikhel in Kavre along the Araniko Highway to six lanes is not going to be completed on time. The project has stated that the expansion work will not be completed in the remaining eight months.
The target was to complete this 16 km long road, which was started on December 24, 2079 BS, within 36 months. The road section has been divided into two sections, from Suryabinayak to Sanga and from Sanga to Dhulikhel, and the contract agreement is being signed accordingly. The project has stated that the expansion work of the two sections is currently about 45 percent complete.
Sajna Adhikari, Senior Divisional Engineer and Information Officer of the project, says that the expansion work will not be completed within the stipulated time and therefore a few months should be added. According to him, the work of demolishing houses and towers within the standards, replacing trees, electricity poles and optical fiber cables could not be started on time.
Similarly, the delay was due to disputes over bridges and individual houses in the urban area of Banepa in the Sanga-Dhulikhel section and the inability to demolish houses within the standards, the official said. It is said that about 65 percent of the physical construction work will be completed by the deadline.
Under the said project, an agreement was signed for the expansion of the 8.4 km road section from Sanga to Dhulikhel in the first phase at a cost of Rs 4.564 billion and the Suryabinayak-Sanga road section, which was started in the second phase, at a cost of Rs 3.8893 billion.
The expansion was initiated after traffic jams increased every year due to narrow roads. After the opening of the Tatopani border crossing at Sindhupalchowk, a short-distance border crossing with China, the traffic volume on this highway is increasing day by day. Currently, more than 1,500 long-distance vehicles from the mid-hilly region and eastern Terai leave this highway from Koteshwor daily.
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