Nearly three years after the government’s announcement to replace all the tuins by trail bridges, the KP Sharma Oli-led administration has geared up once again to remove the traditional wire river crossings.

The Ministry of Federal Affairs and General Administration has directed all the local governments to list all the tuins that have not been national priority for replacement.

Since several parts of the country still have tuin crossings over rivers and rivulets, the government on Friday asked them to report if there are any such links within their area.

The ministry lacks actual data on the number of tuins in the country since many are still not in the government database, said Federal Affairs Ministry Spokesperson Suresh Adhikari.

“Scattered settlements made it difficult for the government to install suspension bridges everywhere,” he said.

The ministry is also preparing to survey places in the country where a suspension bridge has to replace tuin immediately.

Tuins continue to be the means for people to cross rivers in places where bridges have not been built. Such crossings claim lives every year. PM Oli, in his first stint, had pledged in 2015 to replace all the tuins by suspension bridges. The government had earmarked Rs3.25 billion to replace the tuins within two years.

Following the government decision on October 12, 2015 to replace 131 tuins, 105 have been substituted with suspension bridges so far. The remaining 26 may be constructed within this year.

The government has allocated Rs3.11 billion in the current fiscal year to fund its plan to replace all the remaining tuins over the next three years.