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The hand pump in front of the house dried up two years ago. An electricity pole stands adjacent to their house, but they have to rely on a tuki (a traditional oil lamp) at night because their house does not have a power meter. They have been married for 10 years, but their marriage hasn’t been registered. And because they don’t have citizenship cards, their son’s birth hasn’t been registered either, which in turn has hindered his school enrolment. These are just some problems that the family of the 30-year-old Rajwati Musahar from Birta of Gaushala municipality in the central plains district of Mahottari has to face. “I often go to the municipality office, but no one listens,” she says.

Hand-to-mouth existence

Birta’s 60 Musahar families—with a total population of 250—are deprived of even basic rights and state services. “We live hand to mouth,” rues Rajwati. “No one understands our pain.”

There is hardly anyone in Birta’s Musahar community who has completed secondary school. Most children haven’t even been to a school. “My children go to morn­ing school, but they cannot be formally enrolled as they don’t have birth certificates,” says Jitani Devi Musahar, another local resident.

Rambabu Shah, chairman of ward 4, says the process of getting children enrolled in schools has already begun. “We will also ensure that the children have books and uni­forms they need in school,” says Shah.

Toilet woes

Part of why the Musahars have been denied government services is that they don’t have a toilet in their homes. The municipality, under its ‘no open defecation’ campaign, has barred households without a toilet from accessing govern­ment services.

“We don’t even have land to build a house, how can we build a toilet?” wonders Kabita Musahar, a mother of two.

“Our settlement has five hand pumps. Four of them went dry after the 2015 quake. We have to stand in a long line to fill water from the remaining one,” says 70-year-old Sukadev Sada.

Bikhani Sada claims that people from other caste groups even stop them from using the hand pump. “We have to go to the nearby pond to bathe and wash clothes. The pond water makes my body itch,” she says.

Shivanath Mahato, mayor of Gaushala municipality, claims that he will make sure the Musahar community will soon have ample access to drinking water.

BY RAJKARAN MAHATO | GAUSHALA, MAHOTTARI

Betting worth tens of millions rupees is tak­ing place every day in Birgunj, an import­ant commercial hub in Nepal’s central plains, in relation to the ongoing Indian Pre­mier League (IPL) cricket tournament. The ille­gal betting takes place openly during each and every IPL match. Bettors include not just young cricket fans, but also industrialists, smugglers, politicians and contractors. In fact, the betting market is so vibrant that offices have been set up secretly to carry out the illicit trade. According to a businessman from Adarshanagar who bets regularly on IPL matches, people have rented rooms in his neighborhood and other parts of the town and turned them into betting joints.

A person whose job is to take bets and pay out money to winners is known as a book­maker, or a bookie for short. In Birgunj, they are referred to as dalals (middle-men). From what I could gather from betters who regularly place big bets with these bookmakers, the main betting ring operates out of Jaipur, Rajasthan. This ring has apparently hired six local bookies in Birgunj.

The modus operandi

The bookies in Birgunj deliver the informa­tion about the wager amount to the agents in Jaipur via their phones. The bookies are also responsible for paying out money to the win­ners and sending cash deposited by the losers to Jaipur. For this job, the bookies receive a cer­tain percentage cut as commission. Here they pocket 20 percent of the total stake.

For every IPL match, a bookie makes Rs 1.5 to 2 million. A person gets to become a bookie only after he deposits a minimum of 2 to 2.5 mil­lion Indian rupees with the Jaipur’s betting ring.

Every bookie in Birgunj collects wagers up to Rs 5 million for a single match. Bets are placed on different categories—the winning team, the runs scored in a particular over, total runs and wickets taken by individual players, etc.

“Only if the bookies have your number saved in their mobile will they take your call. And they don’t entertain bets lower than Rs 10,000. I’d placed a bet of Rs 20,000 on the opening match in favor of the Mumbai Indians, but I lost,” says one cricket fan—and an IPL bettor—from Murli-Sripur. But members of large business-in­dustrial houses and smugglers are known to bet up to Rs 2 million on a single match.

Uninformed police

Despite the scale of the daily transactions, the police is apparently unaware of the illegal betting. DSP Rajan Limbu, spokesperson for Parsa Police, pleaded ignorance about the betting scene in Birgunj. “It’s the first time I’m hearing about IPL betting. We’ll now investigate the matter,” says Limbu.

DSP Limbu’s profession of ignorance not­withstanding, the police had arrested five members of a betting ring with a large sum of money from Adarshanagar in Birgunj during the 2015 IPL.

The Karnali Highway, constructed under the command of the Nepal Army, has been in operation for 11 years. But all these years, passengers haven’t been able to travel safely on the highway, where hundreds have died in road accidents. The highway, which links Surkhet with Jumla, is so treacherous that it is often dubbed a ‘death-way’. In the past two years, although the frequency of accidents has declined, the suffering of the passengers hasn’t. They have to travel for two days to make a trip that should take no more than eight hours. That the highway is only single lane was already a hassle. What has compounded the problem is the delay in the construction of bridges on it.

The government has invested Rs 150 mil­lion to construct five of these bridges. (Cur­rently, most vehicles plying the highway have to ford treacherous rivers.) Another 18 bridges are being built with a World Bank grant of Rs 600 million, according to the Road Divi­sion Office, Jumla. But construction works are marred by problems.

For instance construction of the bridge over Takulla River has been halted, no one knows exactly why. The Road Division had recom­mended that its constructor, Jagriti Tulchi Durga JV, be blacklisted.

“But the Supreme Court issued an order not to place the company on the blacklist,” rues division head Madhav Prasad Adhikari.

However, construction of another bridge project that had earlier been halted has now resumed. The project had begun seven years ago under an agreement that it would be completed in 15 months. But the bridge remains incomplete after seven years, and the construction resumed only recently after the road division warned the constructor, Yakthumhang Goldengate JV, that it would be blacklisted.

“The company has agreed to bear all the additional cost incurred by the delay and to seek payment only after the construc­tion is complete,” says the Road Division Office, Jumla. This bridge is being built at a spot where vehicles get stuck for weeks when there’s a landslide.

Raj Bahadur Mahat, chairperson of Jumla Civil Society, laments that the government has failed to take action against construction companies that have dragged construction for years. “These companies enjoy political protection, which is why they can get away with abandoning the work. If the state is indeed serious about Karnali’s welfare, upgrading the highway is a must,” says Mahat.

The road division claims that building the bridges and widening the highway is a top pri­ority, and that construction has picked up pace after it took charge of the work in February. Earlier the Nepal Army was in charge.

The road division office claims that is doesn’t have the necessary budget for highway expan­sion and upgrade. It also argues that construc­tion work has suffered due to the region’s remoteness and the 2015-16 blockade.

By Govinda Devkota | Nepalgunj

The much-awaited Melamchi Water Supply Project is finally near completion. A ‘breakthrough’ on April 10 in the 7.5-km Sindhu-Gyalthum section of the 26-km tunnel has raised the odds that Melamchi River’s water will reach the Kathmandu Valley before the Dashain festival in October.

Minister for Water Supply and Sanitation Bina Magar said that with the latest breakthrough, the tunnel-digging work of the project has been completed. “We intend to finish the remaining tasks in the next four months, so valley residents will get to consume the water from Melamchi latest by Dashain,” said Magar. After taking over the ministry on Feb­ruary 18, Magar had observed the project site and instructed the project chief to carry out the breakthrough in 25 days. It was completed four days before the deadline.

Of the total project cost of Rs 76.7 billion, Rs 24.2 billion has already been spent, with 80 percent being borne by the Asian Development Bank and the remaining by the Nepal government.

The main objectives of the project, according to the ADB, are to alleviate the chronic water shortage in Kathmandu Valley on a sustainable, long-term basis, and to improve the health and well-being of its inhabitants. It is expected to bring 170 million liters of water to the capital every day. The much-delayed proj­ect also seeks to develop a comprehensive institutional framework for urban water management in the valley.

Earlier breakthroughs in the tunnel work included the 9.4-km Sundarijal-Sindhu sec­tion in 2016 and the 8.2-km Gyalthum-Ambathan section in late 2017.

“Melamchi’s water will be supplied to Kathmandu’s households in September if things go smoothly. But even if there are technical difficulties, that will happen by October,” says Ramchandra Devkota, executive director of the Melam­chi Water Supply Board.

“We are working on a Detailed Project Report to bring an additional 170 million liters of water each from Yangri and Larke rivers. Both will require 11-km long tunnels,” said Devkota. Tiresh Prasad Khatri, director of the Project Imple­mentation Directorate, KUKL, informed that the state water utility will need 15 days to supply water to households after it reaches Sundarijal.

By YUVARAJ PURI | SINDHUPALCHOK

With inputs from Gopikrishna Dhungana in Kathmandu