As a result, over three dozens vehicles carrying vegetables bound to Tarai districts from Dhankuta remain stranded on the highway and vegetables worth thousands of rupees have begun to rot. [break]
Shiva Nanda Sah, a vegetable supplier of Damak who has been stranded on the highway, said, “I have already thrown loads kilograms of vegetables worth around Rs 100,000 into the Leuti River as they rotted due to scorching heat.”
Still, he doesn´t know when the road will be cleared. The vehicles stranded on the highway have formed a long serpentine queue.
The Road Division Office in the district has stated that it will take a few more days to repair the road.
According to Shah, over three dozens of trucks carrying vehicles are stranded on the highway. After the vegetables started rotting, vegetable suppliers have started to hire local porters to pass the vegetables through the blocked road sections so that they can be ferried to Tarai districts, said Rajesh Sah, another vegetable supplier.
He said the suppliers are incurring a huge loss as they have been forced to pay hefty amount to porters only to cross the damage stretches of the highway.
Mahendra Gurung, managing director of Sidhuwa Multipurpose Cooperative Organization, informed that vegetables being transported to India on 14 vehicles from Dhankuta and Terhathum districts have been completely ruined and have been disposed in the Leuti River.
Vegetables worth Rs. 22, 00, 000 were rotten due to the highway obstruction.
The District Agriculture Development Office has, meanwhile, requested local farmers not to pluck vegetables and send it to market before the highway resumes.
Related story
19th Sawa Lakh Rot Festival begins in Gorkha
_20230203180255.jpg)
