KATHMANDU, SEPTEMBER 19
Kathmandu Metropolitan City today continued excavation to unearth Tukucha Khola (a rivulet) that once flowed through the heart of Kathmandu before builders encroached upon it and constructed structures upon it. The Patan High Court had yesterday issued a stay order to halt excavations.
KMC's team today reached the residential area in Hattisar near Kamal Pokhari with a dozer and started digging to unearth a 500-metre segment of the encroached khola around Kamaladi.
KMC, with support from the federal Ministry of Urban Development, is working to raze structures above the four-metre wide khola. The MoUD had asked KMC to clear encroachment above the rivulet long ago, but KMC initiated work in that regard only recently, with Mayor Balendra Shah's anti-encroachment drive to reclaim government property.
After excavation was intensified, a few locals had moved Patan High Court against KMC's demolition drive.
Yesterday, the court issued an interim order asking KMC to halt the process until the next hearing when the court will hear from both the sides: KMC, as well as locals opposing the excavation.
KMC estimates that five houses and a private building housing Laxmi Bank could be hit by the demolition drive.
Superintendent of KMC Municipal Police Raju Pandey, under whose protection the excavation is going on, said KMC was unaware of any order from the court.
"We have not been officially notified about the order yet," Pandey said. He added that KMC would not demolish any structure without following due legal process.
Meanwhile, the DoA has said it will hold talks with KMC and prevent it from demolishing anything of archaeological value.
A version of this article appears in the print on September 20, 2022 of The Himalayan Times.
