The government chose the NA for the project, through the budget of fiscal year 2066\67. Entrusting the NA to undertake a construction project rather than hiring professional contractors through bidding is not new in Nepal.
“Work by the NA in the past was not controlled and monitored by the government. But the NA will have to work on this project under the complete control of the government,” said a high-ranking official at the ministry.
According to the Ministry of Physical Planning and Works, the NA will be bound to a strict set of norms while carrying out the two-year project and it will be scientifically monitored at every step of the work.
“We have reached a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the NA,” said Joint-Secretary Tulsi Prasad Sitaula, chief of the Works Section at the ministry. “From the design to every significant part of the ground work, the ministry has a parallel role with the NA.”
The government has allocated Rs 250 million as the initial budget for the track-opening phase, and has sent Rs 100 million to the NA to commence the work immediately after the Tihar festival. According to the MoU, the NA will get the funds in installments after evaluation of the work.
The overall role of the NA in the project is said to be more for co-ordination among the petty contractors. The NA will deputize only a few hundred soldiers and prioritize labor opportunities for the locals.
The ground work for the project conducted by the government so far includes an extensive survey and identification of private lands that will have to be acquired. “It will take a little more time to finish the acquisitions as the local administrations in all three districts involved--Lalitpur, Makawanpur and Rautahat--have to be activated to settle compensations,” Sitaula said.
The Kathmandu-Tarai fast track is the loftiest road project Nepal has envisioned and started work on. It will curtail by at least six hours to one and a half hours the journey between the Tarai and the capital. Using this road, one can reach Janakpur from Kathmandu in two and half hours and Biratnagar in five hours.
By the time the four-lane 60 km/hour road is built, it will have cost some Rs 60 billion and will be the first toll road in the country invested in by the private sector. Reliance Group of India and Landmark Company of South Korea have both been selected for final phase investment and operation of the road.
“But the government is yet to see whether more private parties should have a share in the project,” Sitaula told myrepublica.com. “We have a strong school of thought that the public-private partnership (PPP) must be wider.”
The fast track road starts from Khokana in Lalitpur and ends in Bandipur of Rautahat. It follows the bank of the Bagmati River for 50 kms of its length to Shripur, Makawanpur and catches up with the Bakaiya River for the final 25-km segment.
The road is basically designed with two lanes on both sides of the river, and will include some 80 small and large bridges.
As the government is also surveying in Bandipur for an international airport, the road will have more salience as the travel-time to the capital meets globally accepted standards for access roads to an international airport.
According to the ministry, the daily flow of vehicles from the eastern Tarai to the capital via the Prithvi Highway averages 4,000. Foreign companies interested in the project seem to have calculated that the 8,000 or so vehicles plying between the two destinations every day will turn their project into a success, technical officials said.
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