The Sanga-Dhulikhel road widening project is under pressure to meet its deadline. According to the Suryabinayak-Dhulikhel Road Project, only 60 percent of construction work has been completed even though the contractor has just three weeks left before the deadline.

The stretch is part of the Araniko Highway that connects Kathmandu to eastern Nepal and further to the Chinese border. Unmanaged settlements, land disputes and contractor’s delay have slowed down the work.

Project officials said progress remains uneven. Some segments have advanced rapidly, while others have seen no movement for months. Around one kilometre in the Dhulikhel area has already been blacktopped, and blacktopping is currently underway in the Pulbazar-Janagal section.

Engineer Bishnu Khanal, who oversees field operations, said work is moving at full pace in several parts. “The Pulbazar-Janagal stretch on the Kathmandu-to-Banepa side, 800 metres of a 10-metre-wide road, has already been blacktopped,” Khanal said. “On the Banepa-Kathmandu side, preparations for blacktopping are ongoing.”

According to Khanal, cutting on the main lane and gravel laying on the service lane are in progress in the Basghari-Budol area. “At Banepa’s Chandni Chowk, preparations are underway to construct a culvert. In the Chandeshwari area, we are building retaining walls and carrying out filling works,” Khanal said. Cutting work is also ongoing at Dhungedhara in the Sanga-Bhainsepati section.

Despite progress in many places, around 200 metres in the Banepa-Pulbazar stretch have remained untouched for nearly 10 months due to obstructions by local residents. The locals have raised concerns over the alignment of the proposed centerline—an issue as a common source of delays in highway projects, especially where compensation disputes and land demarcation remain contested.

“Local residents have blocked work for almost a year,” said engineer Khanal. “There have been multiple discussions involving the Department of Survey, people’s representatives and the local community, but no agreement has been reached. So we are working at full pace everywhere except in the disputed area,” he added.

Authorities and locals are both concerned over the delayed construction work along the Sanga-Dhulikhel stretch. Bijaya Kumar Mahato, chief of Suryabinayak-Dhulikhel Road Project, said that overall progress along the entire Suryabinayak-Dhulikhel stretch currently stands at about 50 percent. “Around 60 percent work has been completed along the Sanga-Dhulikhel section, while the Suryabinayak-Sanga section stands at 42 percent,” he said.

According to Mahato, six houses still remain to be demolished in the Suryabinayak-Sanga segment. “These houses fall within the road boundary. We have requested the owners to vacate them, and they have committed to doing so soon,” he said.

Lama Construction was awarded the contract to widen the eight kilometer Sanga-Dhulikhel stretch for Rs4.05 billion, with a three-year completion deadline. The contract was signed on December 13, 2022, and the deadline is set for December 12, 2025, leaving just about three weeks to finish the work.

Under the expansion plan, the Suryabinayak-Sanga section, which covers 7.5 kilometres, was contracted to Ashish-Kumar Shrestha-Bandan Bhagawati JV at Rs3.88 billion. Mahato said the time remaining for this stretch is about one and a half months, with the deadline set for January 2, 2026. He insisted that funding is not an issue for both sections. “There is no shortage of budget for the project. Both contractors have been formally notified about the fast-approaching deadline,” said Mahato.

Mahato also said discussions are underway with the contractors about extending the deadlines. “We are evaluating the possibility of extending the project period,” he said. “If extended, our target is to complete blacktopping on both segments by the end of the current fiscal year of 2025-26 [mid-July 2026].”

Despite the delays, project officials remain hopeful that faster work in ongoing sections will compensate for earlier slowdowns. But field engineers admit that unless the centreline dispute at Banepa-Pulbazar is resolved quickly, the entire highway expansion could face prolonged delays.