5th Memorial Day of 2015 Gorkha Earthquake

Today marks the 5th memorial day of the 2015 Gorkha Earthquake. The quake with it epicenter on Barpark in Gorkha district had jolted the country at 11:56 am on this day five years ago.

Over 9,000 persons lost their lives while more than 22,000 people were injured in the quake that measured 7.6 on the Richter scale while over 900,000 personal houses were damaged in the quake.

Although 32 districts in the country were affected by the quake, mostly 14 of them were the hardest hit ones such as Gorkha, Dhading, Nuwakot, Rasuwa, Sindhupalchowk, Dolakha, Ramechhap, Kathmandu, Lalitpur among others. Most casualties were recorded in Sindupalchowk district.

The quake had incurred damages to 7,553 schools, 920 cultural heritages, 1,197 health institutions, 415 government office building and 194 buildings belonging to the security agencies.

Similarly, damage was also incurred on the 762-kilometre of road and more than 1,000 drinking water’s structures.

The National Reconstruction Authority (NRA), which was set up following the quake, said that 88 percentage of reconstruction works had been completed so far. International donor agencies and government of Nepal so far have contributed over Rs 309 billion while non-government agencies have provided over Rs 72 billion for the post-quake relief, rescue operation and reconstruction drive.

NRA CEO Sushil Gyawali said that Nepal has reached a stage when it could confidently share its post-quake reconstruction and rehabilitation experience in the world stage due to the international cooperation and goodwill it received from many sectors.

The post-quake reconstruction work has been affected due to the nation-wide lockdown imposed by the government since March 24 to contain the outbreak of COVID-19, according to the NRA.

As the lockdown is lifted and things begin to revert to normal, NRA is bound to face challenges as management of financial resources, enabling environment for reconstruction houses for those who have availed first installment of reconstruction grant but have not commenced the construction yet, economically empowering the quake-hit persons by launching livelihood programmes among others.