Workers have started to dig the foundation for a housing project to keep the earthquake displaced families at Gupsipakha in Laprak, Gorkha.

The project is funded by the Non-Resident Nepali Association (NRNA) and the Nepal Army (NA) is helping in the construction.

The NA has deployed 39 soldiers at the site to help dig the foundation for the houses.

The NRNA has pledged to build 573 two-storey homes with four rooms for the earthquake displaced families. Each house will be built on three annas of land (roughly 1,026 sq ft) and will cost Rs 1.2 million to complete. 

The NRNA has already taken permission from the local authorities to build the housing by clearing 18.32 ha of forest land at Gupsipakha. 

NRNA Vice Chairman Kumar Panta said the project is expected to be completed in eight months.

Budget released for quake memorial park 

The government has allocated Rs 10 million to construct an earthquake memorial park in Barpak, the epicentre of the 2015 April 25 earthquake. Roshan Shrestha, chief of Urban Development and Building Division Office (UDBDO), said they have started to work on the design of the park.

The District Natural Disaster Rescue Committee had decided to construct a park in memory of the people killed in the earthquake. President Bidya Devi Bhandari had laid the foundation stone for the memorial during her Barpak visit on April 2016.

Police posts still under tents

Fourteen police posts in Gorkha, which were destroyed in the 2015 earthquake, have still not been rebuilt.

The district police chief, SP Janakraj Pandeya, said the police posts were being operated from tents.

The day-to-day operations have been hit and keeping the weapons safe is a major challenge faced by the officers, he added. According to the District Police Office, 38 of its units in Gorkha had suffered damage in the earthquake, and it would cost nearly Rs 240 million to rebuild and restore them. 

145 families get 2nd tranche of aid.

One hundred and forty-five quake-affected families in Gorkha received the second instalment of the housing reconstruction aid recently. Roshan Shrestha, chief of the UDBDO, said the first instalment of the aid was distributed to around 52,000 families in the district and only 4,000 families have registered applications demanding for the second batch of the aid.