GORKHA, March 18: The construction of buildings for the Assistant Chief District Officer and the officials working under him at Durbarmarg, Gorkha Municipality-6, was recently completed. Now the road to reach the well- facilitated building is being graveled. As everything is ready, preparations are underway to shift the officials here. However, the design of the building is yet to be approved.

Despite being constructed by breaching the law, this building will soon come into use. Similarly, the construction work of the building for the District Court (DC) in Gorkha Municipality-6 is going on in full swing. Since, the catastrophic earthquake of 2015 flattened the previous building of the court, a new building with modern infrastructures is being constructed.Now , the contractor has started working on the third floor but no one has approved the building's design yet.

Likewise, the building of Agriculture Information Center is in the final stage of completion. Many government buildings such as the building for the Office of the Attorney General and Irrigation Division Office have already been completed while many are under-construction. District Project Implementation Unit (DPIU) has been carrying out all these works.

Though it is mandatory to approve the design of the building before the construction, this has been widely neglected here. Civil society leaders in the district have widely criticized the government authorities for violating the rules. Prakash Dhakal, an engineer in Gorkha, informed Republica that the designs of none of these buildings have been approved yet.

"The designs of none of the under-construction buildings have been approved so far," said Dhakal, adding, "The authorities concerned seem less interested in forwarding the procedure for the design approval of all these building despite being told repeatedly."As per the rule, no building should be constructed without the approval of its design from the respective local unit.

Meanwhile, DPIU claimed that the central office had already prepared the designs following the standards determined by the government while seeking permission for the project. Engineer Sunita Shrestha, chief of DPIU said, "We haven't started the procedure for the approval of the design but we will do it soon." According to her, approving the design will not be a problem as the buildings are being constructed as per the standards.

 
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