The panel has been formed at a time when survey and demarcation of the track and land acquisition process for the 76-km express highway have been obstructed due to exorbitant compensation demand by the locals.[break]
Punya Prasad Oli, former director general of Department of Land Survey, and Binod Gautam, legal officer of the MoPPW, are the members of the taskforce, while Saroj Man Shrestha, divisional engineer at the MoPPW, is the member secretary, according to a highly placed source at the ministry.
“After getting consent from the Ministry of Finance, we have already sent the names of the taskforce members and mandates of the taskforce to the cabinet for approval,” the source told Republica.
The source added that the panel will be responsible to complete the process of acquiring and handing over the land for the project.
The government needs to acquire over 140 bighas of land for the project.
“The panel will recommend compensation to be paid to landowners to chief district officers (CDOs) of the concerned districts after updating the status of land along the catchment area. It will also update the compensation amount fixed by the Asian Development Bank´s survey conducted in 2008,” the source added.
The panel will assist the CDOs of Kathmandu, Lalitpur and Makawanpur districts in assessing the compensation amount to be paid to the owners of unregistered land.
The process of distributing compensation to the owners of over 40 bighas of land in Makawanpur district has already began, according to the source. However, the process to acquire around 100 bighas of land in Makawanpur, Lalitpur and Kathmandu districts has been affected due to resistance of locals who are demanding unreasonable compensation for their land.
The MoPPW has proposed a budget of Rs 3 million for administrative and other costs for the panel.
Of the total budget of Rs 670 allocated for the project in the current fiscal year, Rs 350 million has been allocated for compensation of land acquired and remaining amount for opening track of the proposed highway.
Nepal Army, which has been entrusted with the responsibility of opening track, has so far opened 22 km of the track.
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