Roads Get Wider

The government has made significant progress in road infrastructure development in the last one year.

"About 708 kilometre road has been black topped while 878 km is gravelled and 717 km road track has been opened in one-year period after the formulation of the present government," said officials at the Department of Roads (DoR). Construction of 92 bridges is also completed. About 1,450 bridges are under construction across the country. 


Information Officer of the DoR Arju Suwal said that 70 km section of the Mid-Hill Highway was blacktopped, 67 km gravelled and 96 km new track was opened last year. 


Similarly, work has been expedited too at the north-south connectivity projects with 8 km track being opened in Hilsa-Simikot road, 29 km track at Koshi Corridor and 34 km at Kaligandaki Corridor.

Postal Highway has witnessed the blacktopping of 58 km section and gravelling of 176 km, and construction of seven bridges. 


According to the DoR, the 46 km-long Galchhi-Trishuli-Betrawati-Mailung road Nadaha-Koshi Bridge-Chatara-Rupnagar road, Leguwaghat-Bojpur road, Haleshi-Diktel road and Bhairahawa-Lumbini-Taulihawa road are moving ahead with desired speed and progress. 


Likewise, expansion of Butwal-Narayangarh (112 km) section of Mahendra Highway is in the final phase of tender. 


The government has completed the pre-feasibility study of tunnel construction at Siddababa in Siddartha Highway, and is evaluating tenders of Naubise-Nagdhunga tunnel road while a request has been sent to Japan government for the construction of Koteshwor-Jadibuti tunnel. 


Meanwhile, the DPR for the expansion of Naubise-Mugling and Mugling-Pokhara section of the Prithvi Highway is completed and the government has requested the Asian Development Bank (ADB) and World Bank for financing. 


National pride road projects are witnessing a sluggish progress for the last many years. The Postal Highway in Terai has achieved only 25 per cent progress in the last 11 years while the Mid-Hill Highway, which is considered as the backbone of development in the hill districts, has achieved 45 per cent physical progress in a decade. 

Likewise, the Kathmandu-Terai Fast Track is gradually achieving momentum. The Nepal Army – developer of the road project – recently said that there has been more than 25 per cent progress in the project. Army has almost finished opening the track, completed the Detailed Project Report (DPR) and made a significant progress in road construction at Nijgadh section. Army has set-up 10 field offices to manage the construction work and has hired multiple contractors to develop the 76-km long expressway at the cost of Rs. 111 billion. 


The Ministry of Finance has ensured that there wouldn't any shortage of funds for the large infrastructure projects and Finance Minister Dr. Yuba Raj Khatiwada has time and again said that he would manage budget for such projects even by transferring funds from the idle projects. 


Quality of roads


Road infrastructure in the country lack desired quality and standards while many of the projects being implemented are myopic and need upgrading in a decade or earlier. Still the government is constructing single lane bridges and narrow roads. Rural agricultural roads have become a major means to spend budget but are seldom taken care of in order to make them all weather roads. 

Absence of competitive laboratory and engineering monitoring has allowed the sub-standard works go unabated. Similarly, the low-bidding provision in the Public Procurement Act has become another hurdle in infrastructure development. As per the provision, the government has to award the tender to the lowest bidders and the latter takes the initial 20 per cent mobilisation cost and never appears in the project site. 


About Rs. 20 billion has been misappropriated in mobilisation cost. The DoR is implementing 906 projects and 242 of them are sick, according to a recent report published by the Commission for the Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA), the anti-graft body in the country.

"There are no effective monitoring mechanisms at the implementing agencies. Quality control tools are rarely used," said the Ministry of Physical Infrastructure and Transport (MoPIT).


Legal instrument in the offing

The NPC said that the project managers, procurement process, poor planning and execution were the major reasons behind the pathetic progress at the national project. It had proposed to formulate an act to address these maladies and define the framework to select and execute the national pride projects but it’s yet to be realised.

In the National Development Action Committee (NDAC) meeting a month ago, NPC Vice-Chairman Prof. Dr. Pushpa Raj Kandel said that the provincial governments should coordinate with the local levels in order to expedite the works at the large infrastructure projects including the national pride projects. 

The NPC is creating a Project Information Management System to create an evidence-based database to support the development work in the country. Such system can create better coordination among the concerned development ministries and other government agencies. 

Similarly, the Public Expenditure Review Commission (PERC) has prepared recommendations for re-prioritising development projects. It has found that the selection of development projects without any set-standards, and finalisation of multi-year projects without the guarantee of resources, implementation without preparedness and action plan and misusing the project designs and tenders within the setting between the government agencies and contractors were the major hurdles in infrastructure development.

According to the DoR, Postal Highway, Madan Bhandari Highway, Mid-Hill Highway and other strategic roads will be completed within four years, and strategy has also been developed for the same. 

It also said that if additional Rs. 12 billion budget was provided, construction of about 400 bridges would be completed within the current fiscal year.

Published in the Special Supplement of The Rising Nepal Daily on 15 February 2019.