Potholes in Kathmandu   

Fifteen days ago, Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba had instructed the concerned agencies to speed up the work to repair potholes in Kathmandu’s roads. The instruction came after a child, Binita Phuyal, was reported dead being swept away by sewerage drain in Nepaltar of Kathmandu and another child, Satya Sapkota of Samakhusi, was also swept away by drainage water in Samakhushi.  It was good to see the PM show concern for public safety. But 15 days later, a number of potholes are staring at our faces as we travel through rather chaotic roads of the valley. In a recent meeting, the PM said the lack of coordination among government agencies is hampering the work, and as such the work is not progressing as desired. This, sadly, has been the state of our affairs for too long. Every PM has the same story to tell us when they fail to fix even the basics: that there is no proper coordination among line agencies and that there is corruption. The sense of agency is lacking even with the prime minister. 

In the last 15 days, we have uncovered numerous road projects inside Kathmandu that remain incomplete for the last two decades. And then we began tracking the progress of mending potholes since the PM’s directive. Very little has been achieved. It is rather ironic that the PM has to call upon an emergency meeting to carry out such a basic job. This episode questions the very system that is supposed to spring us to economic revolution. Construction and repair of roads take frustratingly long time to accomplish in Nepal. For example, it has been more than three years since the construction of Chabhil-Jorpati Bagmati Bridge road (3.6KM) began. More than seven million rupees has been spent on just pouring sand and mud on the road, but the road resembles a field ready for rice plantation. The contractors who are supposed to complete these valley roads have multiple projects worth millions. They also come up with easy excuses to hide their incompetence or disregard to their duties: They blame the government agencies and the lack of coordination among stakeholders. 

We are yet to hear from one government agency that is actually responsible for the road mess in Kathmandu. Everyone is pointing finger at the other, including the PM! Moreover, no contractor or the government offices say the work has not been done. ‘It’s happening,’ they say but children have to die in these roads. These killer roads are just symptoms of bigger problems we are facing when it comes to executing and following up on project progresses. The now infamous Mugling-Narayanghat road has taken lives of scores of innocent people, yet there is no sign of that project being completed even in the next six months. PM Deuba’s instruction to mend Kathmandu’s khaldos were heard but not executed. There have been some temporary repair works in a few places around the city but the problem remains. He should use his good office to dig deeper into the systemic failure of his administration to even complete a basic task of repairing Kathmandu’s potholes before talking about people-friendly government.

 
• days
 
• defiance