In April last year, a 55metre-long motor bridge—worth Rs54million—in Badigarh collapsed while it was under construction. Jay Buddha Construction took the contract for the construction of the bridge in July 2016, pledging to complete it within two years. Several deadlines have been extended since, but the bridge has yet to complete.

Likewise, there are at least a dozen bridges costing millions of rupees that lie incomplete after years of deadline extensions.

Development projects such as bridge and road constructions in the district have been in limbo for years. Deadlines have been extended repeatedly with no results to be seen. Locals blame the contractors of doing substandard work. On the face of it, the local units seem indifferent.

Ram Lal BK, chair of Ruru Chhetra Rural Municipality Ward No. 1, said that several development projects have been launched to promote tourism in the district.

“The work is progressing at snail’s pace, if at all,” he said. “These projects are important as they can contribute to the district’s tourism.”

Sub-engineer at the bridge department of the District Road Infrastructure Office Gopal Bahadur Thapa said that contractors would be fined if they don’t complete the project within the deadline.

“But since the contractors come up with multiple excuses, we have had to comply with their demands for deadline extensions,” he said.

If the condition of bridge projects in the district is bad, that of road projects is worse. The construction of the Ridi-Rundrabeni road section started three decades. The section is yet to be gravelled completely. Only about 40km of the section is either blacktopped or gravelled, but the finished work has started to fall apart, with the road developing potholes. The contractor, Rautaha Harihari Company, was supposed to complete the gravelling by August 2017, but the road lies incomplete even today, after multiple deadline extensions and change of contractors.

Chief of the Road Infrastructure Office Gopi Raj Pun Magar pointed out several reasons—such as poor management of the project by the contractor companies and a lack of workforce—behind incomplete works.

“We monitor every project in the district,” he said. “But the contractor companies come with excuses, and some of them are valid.”

But Hari Kumar Shrestha, secretary of Construction Entrepreneurs’ Association, pointed out more insidious reasons behind the infrastructure fiascos.

“The local units open tender only towards the end of a fiscal year,” he said. “Then the contractors have to go through several hurdles—a lack of funds, labour force and raw material.”

And even if the work is done in time, there is no assurance regarding its quality for lack of robust monitoring, said Lakshman Parajuli, chief of District Coordination Committee. “The contractors take up projects more than their capacity, then they lack enough manpower, and the budget is not disbursed in time,” he said. “There are problems in the government side as well: they lack a technical team to monitor the ongoing projects.”

Photo: The under-construction Nistikhola Bridge.