October 28: The Pushpalal Mid-Hill Highway is unlikely to be completed within the given deadline. The national pride project will be delayed due to the Covid-19 pandemic as well as lack of budget while in some places the route has not been finalized yet.

The project officials informed that the target set for completion in the past has been deferred and the deadline is likely to be extended by another two years. However, the project faces an uphill battle to complete the remaining works within the extended deadline of two years as the current works progress is 68 percent in 14 years since the construction started.

Demarcation of road in Gorkha and Dhading is also facing problems due to the Budhi Gandaki reservoir project. Arjun Prasad Aryal, chief of the project directorate, said that they are considering the prospect of changing the route because the proposed route will be submerged once the Budhi Gandaki project comes into operation.

If the highway is constructed as per the plan, more than 900 houses have to be demolished in Kaski district. Therefore, stakeholders have been demanding a change in route to avoid demolition of those houses as the project cannot afford compensation to them.

Chief of the project directorate Aryal said that 37 bridges along the proposed highway are yet to be constructed. Those bridges will be completed within a year, according to Aryal

The government's policies and programmes for the current fiscal year state that apart from widening 462 km of roads and bridges constructed by other projects, the construction works of the mid-hill highway will be completed in the next two years. The project, on the other hand, says that the current work progress indicates otherwise.

Although the government has adopted a policy not allow budget crunch for national pride projects, the Pushpalal Mid-Hill Highway as well as the postal highway project faced budget crunch last year.

Secretary at the Ministry of Physical Infrastructure and Transport, Rabindranath Shrestha, said that the highway is not likely be completed within the deadline considering the current progress.

As of mid-October, the physical progress of the project is 58.35 percent and the financial progress is 63.85 percent. The project has spent 6.28 percent of the allocated budget this year. As of mid-October, the project has achieved 8.43 percent physical progress as per this year's target.

Out of the total 137 bridges to be constructed on the highway, 90 bridges have been completed so far. Currently, 20 bridges are under construction and 27 are under the process of signing contracts.

As an alternative to the East-West Highway, the starting point of the highway is Chiobhanjyang of Panchthar district and the last point is Jhulaghat of Baitadi.

The highway connecting 26 districts of the mid-hills will build new cities in different places. The project was started in the fiscal year 2064/65 with a target to complete it within FY 2073/74. But the deadline has been pushed to FY 2079/80.

The initial cost of the project was estimated to be Rs 33.36 billion while the revised cost is Rs 84.33 billion.