Five persons have gone missing in the swelling Trishuli river after a makeshift tuin — a cable crossing — bridging Jyamire Ghat of Dhading and Ghyalchowk of Gorkha broke up Monday. [break]
About a year ago on July 3, Rajendra Neupane, an engineer associated with Scott Wilson Nepal, drowned after falling from a tuin he was travelling to cross the Mahakali river snapped. Manja Bohara of Malkot-8 in Kalikot district lost his life on April 15 last year while using a similar tuin to cross the Khulalu river that flows between Bharta and Lalu villages.
These tuin mishaps are only some of the reported cases among scores of similar accidents that claimed over 50 lives in impoverished and remote districts in the past four years.
Despite a rapid growth in the construction of suspension bridges in the past one decade, human casualties have gone unabated due to worn-out tuins which are the sole means of crossing rivers in remote hinterland. "We have no provision of setting aside budget for the upkeep of aging tuins which are becoming more perilous with the passage of time.
"Wherever suspension bridges have been constructed, it was done under political pressure rather than based on merit or hardships faced by the people," Gaya Prasad Ulak, an engineer with Suspension Bridge Division at Department of Local Infrastructure and Agriculture Roads (DoLIAR), told Republica on Thursday. He said DoLIAR provides technical support to construct suspension bridges which are recommended by the District Development Committees and passed by the District Council.
"We allocate an annual maintenance cost of Rs 3,000 for each suspension bridge. But unfortunately, we have no budgetary head for the maintainance of the tuins, which have already taken many lives in the recent past. It is sorry to say that no government agency has any record of existing tuins in the country, the engineer said. However, he said about 500 tuins are functioning across the country.
In a bid to replace deadly tuins used in remote districts to reduce such casualties, the government has devised a five-year plan to speed up construction of trail bridges which are far safer and comfortable than traditional tuins. However, the construction couldn´t go on as per the plan due to poor budgetary allocation which is far lower than what has been actually demanded.
The government had allocated around Rs 350 million during the current fiscal year against the demand of Rs 600 million by DoLIAR to construct 400 new trail bridges.
"We have succeeded in completing only 300 trail bridges out of the targeted 400 bridges in the current fiscal year due to insufficient budget," Ulak said. In addition to the government funding, different donor agencies are supporting construction of suspension bridges through different projects.
Suspension Bridge Program of the government and Rural Rehabilitation and Reconstruction Project (RRRP) are constructing around 200 and 100 bridges respectively. Similarly, Rural Access Improvement and Decentralization Project (RAID) and Decentralized Rural Infrastructure and Livelihood Project (DRILP) are constructing 70 and 30 suspension bridges respectively.
Last fiscal year, only 200 trail bridges were constructed against the target of 300 bridges due to lower budget allocation of Rs 270 million, compared to actual demand of Rs 450 million. Under the proposed five-year plan that started from the fiscal year 2009-10, DoLIAR has set a target to construct 2,200 suspension bridges at the cost of over Rs 4.5 billion. In addition to 700 bridges proposed in the last two fiscal years, 1,500 new bridges will be constructed in the coming three fiscal years. "This year, we have demanded Rs 750 million to construct 500 suspension bridges in the coming fiscal year," the engineer with DoLIAR said.
In addition, CARE Nepal has also constructed over 200 trail bridges of which 15 are being constructed this year. Gorkha Welfare Fund and Practical Action Nepal are involved in constructing gravity rope way and tuins.
"We have proposed a plan to improve and construct new tuins in some districts by strengthening capacity of DDCs in coming days," Ulak said.
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