KATHMANDU – Long awaited Melamchi Drinking Water Project, which was expected to complete by October, is likely to take longer time to supply drinking water to Kathmandu Valley. Contractor CMC, the Italian company, has not performed works as expected even in the extended period.
The government extended contract period by September 30, agreeing to flow water at Sundarijal. However, the government officials suspected that the deadline would not be met as nothing special progress has been achieved in one month of extended period.
Rajendra Pant, Spokesperson at Melamchi Drinking Water Project Development Committee, said only seven kilometers out of 27km tunnel has been concreted and finished. “When 112 meter finishing is completed someday but only 50m is finished in average,” he said. “In such a pace, how can it be completed within the deadline? If 50m tunnel work is completed daily in each of five places at a time, the project will not be completed on time.”
Only 1.8km was concreted from June 15 to July 15. The construction of head box is yet to begin though works of tunnel concreting are on. Though the CMC requested the government earlier to provide compensation of Rs 1.65 billion and extend project period by 540 days, the Ministry of Drinking Water extended only three months.
Surya Prasad Kandel is presently the Executive Director at Melamchi Drinking Water Project Development Committee. Earlier Ram Chandra Devkota was executive director while project manager and tunnel lining engineer have been also transferred.
The project cost was estimated at Rs 17 billion when it was started, according to the project. In 2014, the project cost was changed to Rs 23.45 billion but Rs 23.67 billion has been spent till now, said the ministry. “Now, the estimated cost of project has reached to Rs 27.76 billion,” said spokesperson Pant.
The works of the project began two decades ago aiming to supply drinking water to the capital city. The project tunnel constitutes of 9km section of Sundarijal-Sindhu, 9km of Sindhu-Gyalthum, and 9km of Gyalthum-Ambathan.
The project has a capacity of supplying 80 million liters of water daily. “Melamchi has capacity of 170 million liters. After bringing 340 liters of water from Yangri and Larke rivers, total capacity of project will reach 510 million liters,” said Pant.
