One week on, public still struggling to climb Dharahara

KATHMANDU, Sept 25: One week has passed since the new Dharahara tower, a replica of the 19th century monument, was opened for the public in the aftermath of the 2015 earthquake. However, the general public is still struggling to acquire tickets to climb the tower due to their unfamiliarity with the online ticketing system.

Eknarayan Giri, of Pokhara Metropolitan City-24, was lucky enough to climb the tower on Tuesday after getting tickets at the expense of two people from a group of four who did not show up at the 22-storey tower. He returned home to Pokhara the following day. Hundreds of people keep on queuing up at the gate of the tower each passing hour with the hope of getting a chance to climb the tower in vain.

While he was gleeful for getting the opportunity to watch the capital from the recently constructed tower, Giri said that he would have had to return home without climbing the tower had he not been lucky. 

“I would not have been able to get a ticket from the internet as I am not as technologically-educated as the youth,” Giri told Republica, “If the other persons had arrived in time to climb the tower, I would have had to return to Pokhara without getting a chance to see Kathmandu from the top of Dharahara.” 

Another lucky entrant to the tower on Tuesday, Pooja Pandey from Kailali district, expressed similar views about the inability of the older generation to acquire online tickets due to technical unawareness of the working of the internet.

“Perhaps, the younger generation will find it easier to get the tickets on the internet,” she told Republica, “We, the older generation, will need to ask our children or grandchildren to get the tickets for us.” She also returned back home to Kailali the following day.

Meanwhile, officials from the Dharahara Reconstruction Plan, the government body working with the private contractor to construct the tower, informed Republica that the opening of the tower is only aimed at testing the visitor capacity of the tower. “Currently, we are only issuing 100 tickets for each hour of the tower’s operation, out of which 80 are issued online,” Deputy-Director at the plan Lila Khatiwada told Republica, “The remaining 20 tickets are issued to senior citizens and differently abled persons on the basis of need.” With such a provision only aimed at the two groups of people, the members of the general public without internet-literacy are deprived of the chance to get a ticket to the tower on-site.

Dharahara construction to be completed in a month

Deputy-Director Khatiwada informed Republica that about 97 percent of the construction work for the tower has been completed, with the remaining works slated to be completed in a month. 

“The remaining three percent of the construction work pertains to electrical and mechanical testing, and some glass installation,” he told Republica, “The contractor has assured us that the remaining works will be completed in a month as per their contract.”

He added that even after the completion of the tower, the contractor will be on an additional two months inspection period whereby any problems observed in the facility will be resolved by the contractor. 

The historic Dharahara tower which earlier stood at 11 storeys was destroyed by the 2015 earthquake, following which an even taller 22-storey version of the tower has been constructed next to the vestige of the older tower. Before the reopening of the tower, the contractors were provided seven extensions to the construction deadline due to incomplete work.  

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