Valley roads: Probe team submits ‘incomplete’ report
Says line ministries did not help
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KATHMANDU, DEC 17 -
The committee formed to study the status of roads in the Valley and Kalanki-Nagdhunga section has submitted its preliminary report to the Prime Minister's Office without completing its mandated tasks--status of roads, amount of budget spent for construction and quality.
Committee members said they could not come up with a conclusion because of non-cooperation from the ministries of Local Development, and Physical Planning and Works.
“We could not complete the report as they did not provide information within the given deadline. It's our interim report,” said Jaya Mukunda Khanal, coordinator of the probe committee. The panel, whose term expired on Thursday, was given two months to complete its tasks.
Prime Minister Baburam Bhattarai had formed the committee to find out the amounts of budget spent for roads' construction, their quality and status following several complaints of irregularities and possible kickbacks.
After the subsidiary bodies of the ministries like District Development Committee, municipality and Village Development Committees turned down their requests to provide information on budget spent for road construction and projects being operated in their respective areas in the last week of November, the committee had asked MoLD to provide the details. Similarly, MoPPW was also requested to produce expenditure details and projects. “They didn't cooperate with us within the deadline,” said Khanal. Khanal said the status of road within the Valley was not satisfactory. “We found irregularities both in selection and construction of projects. Interestingly, we could not find out how many offices are involved in road construction,” said another committee member Madan Khadka.
The preliminary report has pointed out that roads lack basic norms, records of upgraded roads and expenditures. “We found that most roads seem constructed under political pressure,” added Khadka.
According to committee members, some offices that do not have mandate to construct roads were also found involved in this sector. They said some 16 offices including the Department of Urban Development and Building Construction were involved in road construction.
Posted on: 2011-12-17 09:08
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