Okhaldhunga, April 10

Elected people’s representatives in Okhaldhunga have expressed their concern about development projects that have been left in limbo for a long time now on different pretexts.

Lately, they have intensified monitoring of development projects pledging action against the contractors deliberately delaying the projects.

“Earlier there were no elected representatives, but now that there are elected representatives, we all need to do the needful to discourage irregularities in the name of development projects,” said District Coordination Committee Chief Jaya Bahadur Shrestha.

Just yesterday, federal Parliament member Yagyaraj Sunuwar and DCC chief Shrestha jointly monitored the under-construction bridge over Molungkhola River that links Molung and Sunkoshi rural municipalities. On the occasion, contractor of the bridge project was made to pledge publicly to expedite the bridge construction.

After three contract extensions, the project is supposed to be over by the end of this fiscal. “There were various reasons that accounted for delay so far. The bridge now will be completed by the end of this year at all cost,” vowed Rabindra Lama, representative of the contractor company Waiba Keurini JV Construction.

Meanwhile, following the monitoring of bridge construction, the team had reached Bhulke of Mulkharka yesterday to monitor construction work of the Molung-Ekbar road that started more than four years ago.

“As we are serious about timely completion of the projects, the contractors who can’t complete projects on time won’t be considered for other projects in future,” Sunuwar warned.

According to sources, a dozen projects that are supposed to be complete by now haven’t even entered the construction phase, while others have been left incomplete.