An alternative to the MDWP must be found to address the perennial drinking water crisis in the Valley
Touted as a game changer in addressing the drinking water crisis of the Kathmandu Valley, the government had poured billions of rupees into the Melamchi Drinking Water Project (MDWP) to bring water from the Melamchi River in Sindupalchowk. No sooner had the MDWP started distributing water through the 27-km-long tunnel to the Valley denizens than a massive mud flood in the river buried the project's headworks last year, raising questions about the future and sustainability of the national pride project. The Melamchi Water Supply Project (MWSP) has closed the main gate of the headworks to prevent the tunnel from further damage by this year's monsoon floods, which are sure to bring more debris, boulders and sand to the headworks area as the mountains upstream are still fragile and falling due to the massive earthquake in 2015. The supply of drinking water to the Valley was resumed just a month ago, after a hiatus of 10 months of its operation. The concerned authorities have said the project would remain closed till the end of the monsoon, considering the threats of floods and debris entering the tunnel. The closure of the project at least for four months is sure to create drinking water scarcity in the Valley. Before its closure, the project was supplying 170 MLD of water every day in the Valley.
The MDWP, which took several years to construct, had first started distributing water to the Valley from March 28 last year. However, the water supply was disrupted following major floods on June 15 last year, and it was closed for 10 months due to the accumulation of several meters of debris at the headworks, which could not be removed even after the end of the monsoon as an access road to the project and bridges along it had been damaged by the floods. An alternative route was developed to channel the water into the tunnel, avoiding the headworks, a measure which poses serious threats to the tunnel's stability. The authorities have said they would have no option other than to close the headworks during the monsoon at least for two years till the construction of permanent headworks is completed, and the risk of landslides upstream of the project is minimised.
The future of the MDWP hangs in the balance because of the fragile mountains upstream of the project's headworks. It will take many years to stabilise the mountains shaken up by the quake. The heavy investments made in the project with a view to providing dependable drinking water to the Valley denizens have gone to waste because of the geological condition of the entire area. As the future of the project appears to be uncertain, the concerned government agencies have now started looking for alternatives to the MDWP, which will continue to remain disrupted for many years. This project has also taught us a lesson that a mega project, which needs to deal with an unstable geology, should not be built spending billions of rupees. Things could have been quite different had the government and the policymakers opted for building small-scale water reservoirs to store rainwater in and around the Valley's green mountains. They would have been cost effective and more sustainable than the MDWP, which has now proved to be a white elephant.
Welcome decision
The government's decision to revive Hetauda Textile Industry that has been shuttered for more than two decades is welcome, although how it intends to do so remains the question. The factory built with Chinese assistance in the Seventies was producing high quality cloth, but it fell into bad times due to mismanagement and politics, and had to be eventually closed. Had the industry survived, it would have been producing tens of millions of metres of cloth, substituting imports and providing gainful employment to thousands. Some of the machinery in the factory is said to be good condition, although such machines are no longer made in China or elsewhere, while others will need to be replaced.
When Baburam Bhattarai was the finance minister a decade ago, he had allocated budget to revive the textile mill. However, nothing has been done towards running the factory since. A study conducted in 2018 had given different models for operating the industry, including solely by the government, in partnership between the Nepal Army and the government, or jointly by the three security forces. However, it is best the government stay away from running the factory at a time when out of the 44 public enterprises in the country, 19 are running in loss.
A version of this article appears in the print on June 02, 2022, of The Himalayan Times.
