Suspension bridge program seen crumbling due to fund crunch

KATHMANDU, Jan 7:

Fund crunch is likely to hit the government plan of building 365 suspension bridges, or one suspension bridge in a day, within the current fiscal year 2014/15.

Officials of Department of Local Infrastructure Development and Agricultural Roads (DoLIDAR) say funding gap will make it impossible for them to construct more than 20 to 25 long-span bridges in the current fiscal year.

Though the government had allocated Rs 1.53 billion for the program in 2014/15, officials of the DoLIDAR have said only Rs 800 million have been released so far. They said that they have no idea from where the remaining fund will come.

"It is very hard to build 365 suspension bridges in this fiscal year under ´one suspension bridge in a day´ program due to budget crunc”," Jeevan Kumar Shrestha, director general of DoLIDAR, told a meeting of Development Committee of the legislature-parliament held on Tuesday.

Talking with Republica, Shrestha said they were running short of an estimated Rs 350 million to complete all the bridges, including short-span suspension bridges, as planned.
According to DoLIDAR, it built a total of 374 suspension bridges in the last fiscal year.

"With the available fund, we will not be in position to build more than 20 to 25 long-span suspension bridges in this fiscal yea”," DoLIDAR´s director general Shrestha told the committee meeting.

A total of 5,736 suspension bridges have been built in the country as at 2013/14, according to DoLIDAR.

The demand for suspension bridges has gone up in recent years. “

"We have been getting demand from various CA members to build suspension bridges in their respective areas. However, low budgetary allocation compared to last fiscal year and rising construction cost has made things difficult for us," Shrestha said. "Still, we are trying our best to build as many bridges as possible through SWAp model by channeling technical and financial support of donor agenci”s."

Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) and HELVETAS Swiss Intercooperation, among others, have been supporting the government to build suspension bridges in different parts of the country.

Speaking at the meeting, lawmakers drew the attention of DoLIDAR officials for regular maintenance of suspension bridges across the country. Rabindra Adhikari, chairman of the committee, said budget should not be a constraint for necessary infrastructure project“. "We will discuss with the Ministry of Finance to make sure that the program is not affected due to fund crunch," he added.

Source: Republica