A road collapsed at Daunne along the East-West Highway at around 4pm on Monday, leaving just one lane open for the traffic on the narrow cliffside road. Passengers were caught in hours-long traffic jams following the road collapse. On Tuesday, the district administration issued a notice halting transportation in the Daunne area from 8am onwards for repair work, causing kilometers long traffic jams. However, the local administration was forced to reopen one lane to ease traffic jams.

“I was stuck in a jam for more than two hours in the Daunne area. It has been more than five years that one hardly passes through Daunne area without facing a traffic jam,” lamented Yashoda Panthi of Bhumahi in Nawalparasi West. She was on her way to Kawasoti on Tuesday. It takes around two hours to reach Kawasoti from Bhumahi when the road condition is normal. But on Tuesday, it took her more than four hours to reach her destination.

Panthi’s hardship is just a case in point.

The Daunne road section is a part of the Butwal-Narayanghat road of the East-West Highway. The condition is particularly poor along the 14 km Daunne road stretch between Dumkibas and Bardaghat. The road in the area is quite narrow and the topography is fragile. The Daunne area turns into a bottleneck on one of the busiest stretches of the East-West Highway. It takes more than three hours for vehicles to crawl through the stretch.

“The Daunne road is in a pathetic condition. Traffic congestion has been unavoidable in the area for the past few years. There is extremely low visibility on the road due to the dust on sunny days. And the road turns into a muddy field when it rains.

The ongoing road expansion work along the Butwal-Narayanghat road further exacerbates the road condition in the Daunne area. The area has been quite prone to landslides after the hillside was cut for widening the road.

In view of the traffic congestion, the Department of Roads signed an agreement with the China State Construction Engineering Corporation to implement the road project in February 2019. As per the project agreement, the existing two-lane road is to be widened to six lanes in market areas, four lanes in forest areas and three lanes in the Daunne hill section. The contractor had divided the Narayanghat-Butwal road into two sections—48-km Daunne-Gaindakot section and 66-km Daunne-Butwal section. The road widening work was initiated with Rs17 billion loan assistance from the Asian Development Bank.

The initial deadline for the widening work was August 17, 2022. After the construction was not completed on time, the deadline was extended to July 27, 2023. The project deadline was extended to July 23, 2024 for the second time.

Two weeks ago, the deadline was further extended by another year due to continued delays in the work. Only 52 percent of the work has been completed in the past six years, according to officials.

The contractor, China State Construction Engineering Corporation, abruptly halted the work, citing the monsoon. It has proposed to resume work on October 31.

The Butwal-Narayanghat section is one of the busiest roads on the East-West Highway. It is a major road linking Lumbini, Karnali, and Sudurpaschim provinces to the national capital and other parts of the country. According to the district traffic police office, over 10,000 vehicles use the road section daily.

Meanwhile, the blocked Kalikot-Jumla road stretch of the Karnali Highway reopened on Tuesday. The landslide triggered by heavy rains blocked the road section at Chaukhola area in ward 10 of Khadachakra Municipality on Monday morning. The landslide could not be cleared as huge rocks blocked the road. The authorities used explosives to blast the rock on Tuesday and managed to reopen the one lane for traffic.

Hundreds of passengers were stranded in the area due to the blockage. “We were stranded on the road for more than 24 hours,” said Krishna Bahadur Shahi who was heading for Jumla from Surkhet.

Similarly, transportation remains disrupted along the Jamune-Jhyangla rural road in Tinau Rural Municipality of Palpa over the past one month after a road collapsed at the Banchare area. According to Sher Jung Thapa, a resident of ward 2 of Tinau, around 80 metres section of the road has collapsed due to landslides in the area. “Vehicles could not be operated along the road section over the past one month. The flooded Dobhan stream further swept away the foundation of the road on Sunday,” said Thapa, adding that the local people of Jhyangla, Bagaha, Paltange, Khulkhule, Bhutaha, Hapur, Hariyaligaun and Mahapur village have been hugely affected due to prolonged road obstruction.