A massive landslide at Tuin Khola on the Narayanghat–Muglin Highway has left the busy road eerily quiet.

On Wednesday, there were hardly any buses or passengers in sight. Instead, the road was lined with trucks stuck bumper to bumper, many of them carrying sacks of onions, garlic, and potatoes.

Some trucks were loaded with sugar, bananas, and construction materials, while LPG bullets and fuel tankers were also stranded along the route.

Near Topekhola, about one and a half kilometres from the landslide site, two truck drivers, Nabin Chaudhary from Sarlahi and Pawan Rana from Chitwan, were cooking breakfast by the roadside with their helpers.

Chaudhary’s truck was carrying 421 bags of sugar from Sarlahi.

“We left Sarlahi on September 21. By now, we should have made at least two trips to Kathmandu, where sugar demand peaks during the festival season. But it’s been three days and we haven’t even managed one delivery,” he said.

His truck made it only as far as Ramnagar in Chitwan before the roadblock, and he has no idea when he will reach Muglin. Though there are reports that the road may reopen by Thursday, he doubts it.

Even if the Tuiun Khola landslide is cleared, Chaudhary worries more rocks and mud could fall elsewhere along the Kathmandu route, where smaller slides have already been reported.

Rana, who was hauling poultry feed from Tandi in Chitwan to Kathmandu, was equally frustrated. “I keep getting calls from Kathmandu, asking me to bring the feed quickly. But with the road buried like this, we are helpless,” he said.

Their cargo can last for some time, but others are not so lucky. Trucks carrying perishable goods like garlic, onions, and bananas have been stranded on the highway for five days.

Drivers complained that the road office has not deployed enough operators and machines to clear the debris and that food prices along the road have shot up.

The Narayanghat–Muglin Highway is Nepal’s main lifeline, linking the capital Kathmandu and the tourist hub Pokhara to the East–West Highway.

The trouble began last Friday evening when a landslide near Tuin Khola blocked traffic.

Even before that debris could be cleared, a bigger landslide struck on Saturday morning. After 45 hours of work, one-way traffic resumed on Sunday afternoon, and by Monday the highway was open both ways.

But falling rocks kept the road unstable, with traffic opening and closing intermittently.

On Tuesday evening at around 5 pm, a massive slide once again brought everything to a halt.

According to Krishna Acharya, information officer at the Bharatpur Division Road Office, nearly 14,000 cubic metres of mud and boulders have piled up on the road. “This is an exceptionally large landslide,” he said, noting that the volume could cover an area the size of two football fields under almost two metres of earth.

Excavators have been working from both Narayanghat and Muglin sides, and field engineer Arjun Ghimire said the road could reopen by Thursday night. For now, the administration has urged travellers to use alternative routes.

“Because we asked buses to take alternative roads, you don’t see passengers stuck here. Yesterday, police buses ferried stranded travellers back to Narayanghat. That’s why the road now looks quiet,” said Superintendent Govinda Puri of Chitwan Police. However, the alternative routes are narrow and unsuitable for heavy trucks.

Not far from Chaudhary and Rana, bus driver Damodar Bhandari was also putting up on the roadside.

He had been driving passengers from Dang to Kathmandu when the road closed.

“We were stuck since 3 am Tuesday. At first we hoped to get through, but by evening the big slide blocked everything. I had 35 passengers, but now all of them have found their own way forward,” he said, stirring a pot of food with other drivers.

With no way to cross the landslide-buried area on foot, many travellers have been using a suspension bridge over the Trishuli river about five kilometres from Muglin.

A parallel road is being built along the Tanahun side of the Trishuli, allowing small vehicles and motorcycles to bypass the blocked stretch.

Travellers stranded at Muglin have been crossing the bridge to continue their journeys, while others have done the same in reverse to reach Muglin. Truckers said small vehicles kept moving throughout Tuesday night along this side road.

Passengers, willing to take risks, are still managing to move forward.

But for cargo trucks, waiting is the only option. With the Narayanghat–Muglin Highway carrying not just passengers but also critical supplies to the capital, it has long been considered Kathmandu’s lifeline.

This lifeline, however, has now been choked by landslides just as the country enters the biggest festive season of the year.