Damage assessment caught slow pace

Kathmandu, Aug 26: Even 16 months after the devastating earthquakes in April and May last year, the government is yet to complete the damage assessment in several districts.

The government has so far completed its survey in 11 severely affected districts. Assessment is underway in Kathmandu, Bhaktapur and Lalitpur.

The National Reconstruction Authority (NRA) earlier this month had announced it would assess the damage caused by the quake across the country.

It published the plan to conclude the assessment of the damaged private houses and other infrastructure in the quake-hit districts by mid-September this year.

However, the progress is slow.

A month-long special campaign was announced by the reconstruction authority to conclude the survey and distribute the first installment of the housing grant.

NRA joint secretary Khom Raj Koirala informed that the data collection in the Kathmandu Valley would be completed within the given timeframe.

He reiterated the NRA commitment to provide the first installment of the house reconstruction grant in time.

"Details of approximately 58,000 households have been collected in the districts of the Kathmandu Valley on the server of the Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS). About 70 per cent of the field work has been completed," informed Koirala.

He claimed that the reconstruction body and its sub-regional and district offices had been working on a war footing to get the work done in time.

But the NRA has a Herculean task before it to complete the damage assessment in the remaining 17 quake-hit districts and other districts that saw minor damage.

"The NRA has decided to conduct the damage assessment survey across the country on special requests," informed NRA spokesperson Ram Prasad Thapaliya.

Similarly, slightly more than 171,000 households, of the 533,058 families, in the 11 districts, have received the first installment of the house reconstruction grant while more than 100,000 households have filed complaints at the NRA or other government agencies, claiming that they were also eligible for the grant money.

Preliminary survey in the immediate aftermath of the earthquake showed that more than 715,000 houses were damaged by the jolts, while the CBS survey concluded that only 533,058 households in the 11 worst affected districts were eligible for the grant of Rs. 200,000, leaving tens of thousands families discontented.

Meanwhile, NRA chief executive officer Sushil Gyawali Friday directed the executive officers in the districts to expedite the damage assessment and grant distribution work.

He had earlier announced a plan to mobilise additional human resources in the field offices and mobilise monitoring teams comprising members of the NRA Executive Committee, chiefs of respective Sub-Regional Offices and other government officers in the districts.