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Inspecting Melamchi Drinking Water Project
Inspecting Melamchi Drinking Water Project
August 10, 2017
Kathmandu: Prime Minster Sher Bahadur Deuba inspected the Melamchi Drinking Water project yesterday. He went around the tunnel, dam and other structures to see for himself the progress in the project, and spoke briefly stating, “It is the project of national pride, and it was the concept of former Prime Minister late Krishna Prasad Bhattarai; so the project needs to be completed as schedule; if any problem you tell me directly to resolve it. The residents of Kathmandu have been dreaming of water coming from Melamchi since 20 years ago”
The visit would certainly boost the morale of the project people, and put the pressure on them to complete it on time. However, the water from Melamchi would flow to Kathmandu only in March 26, 2018 against the target set for September 30, 2017. The Melamchi Drinking Water Development Board had extended the time for completing the tunnel by six months following the Indian sanctions on Nepal and the quakes in 2015 setting the target for completing the tunnel for September, then soft rock encountered at the 2.202 km of the remaining portion of the tunnel toward the Melamchi River has drastically delayed the digging of the tunnel; the progress in digging the tunnel has been only 17 m a day means five more months before completing the construction of the tunnel, then the concreting of the tunnel and giving finishing touch to it would take another six months; as of August 8, 2017, 25.382 Km of the tunnel has been done, the news in “gorkhapatra” of August 10, 2017 stated.
Project Chief Devkota also said that China-15 Railway Bureau had started off the digging of the tunnel since April 2010. After completing six kilometers, the Bureau quit the job in September 2012. The project had contract with the Chinese Company for constructing the tunnel at NPR 4.24 billions. Then, in 2013, the project signed off a contract on digging the rest of the tunnel with the Italian company CMC di Ravenna at NPR 7.72 billions, and the company started the digging of the tunnel in January 2014. The estimated cost of the project is NPR 23 billions; so far, the expenditure has been NPR 22.34 billions.
After the completion of the project, 170 million liters of water a day will flow from the Melamchi River to Kathmandu, and then after the completion of the second phase of this project, the total of 520 million liters of water a day will flow through the same tunnel. However, additional nine kilometers of another tunnel have to be done to complete the second-phase project. The second phase will start in 2018 and complete in 2022, according to the project chief, the news stated.
After the media outcry over the subcontractors halting the work on the Melamchi Drinking Water Project as they did not receive the payments for the work, the Melamchi Drinking Water Development Board put up an ad in the front page of the “gorkhapatra” of August 8, 2017 stating the Board had instructed in writing the CMC di Ravenna through the consulting and project supervising company EPTISA on February 19, 2017, March 3, 2017, March 21, 2017, May 15, 2017, and June 11, 2017, and even call out the company and instructed to resolve the problem of paying the subcontractors and expedite the project work on August 6, 2017. The Board pays CMC di Ravenna for the work, and does not pay to the subcontractors. The Asian Development Bank is providing Nepal with the funding for the Melamchi Drinking Water Project.
