As The Annapurna Express continues to break new grounds in reporting and analysis, we now bring to you our new weekly feature ‘InDepth’ under which we will surgically evaluate an issue of national importance for 10 consecutive weeks. To kick things off, we delve into the Kathmandu-Tarai fast track.
The proposed Nijgadh International Airport in Bara district is among the 22 ‘national pride projects’. But its construction has been halted following a 2019 Supreme Court order. The court ruled that the project, which includes the feeling of potentially millions of trees, was a threat to local wildlife and ecosystem.
To connect the airport with Kathmandu, a 72.5-km Kathmandu-Tarai expressway would be built. While airport construction has stopped, work on the expressway (fast track) continues, albeit at a leisurely pace: Nepal Army, which has been entrusted with the project, last reported a 16.1 percent progress. (The project was supposed to be completed by November 2021.)
Like most other big projects in Nepal, the fast track too has been mired in controversy since the army bagged it in 2017. The project has been hamstrung by allegations of foul-play, cost and time overruns as well as fears over its expected social and environmental impacts. Why this mess? What can be done to improve things? What role should the army play? And how to mitigate the project’s negative impacts? We will analyze them all over the next 10 weeks. We start with a photo feature to give our readers a glimpse of the state of the road project.
1. Photo feature (February 17)
2. Roundtable discussion (February 24)
3. Explainer (March 03)
4. Army’s involvement, pros and cons (March 10)
5. What if… it was completed in Sept 2021? (March 17)
6. Environmental concerns (March 24)
7. The politics behind it (March 31)
8. Social and cultural impact (April 07)
9. Land politics (April 14)
10. What next? (April 21)
A man walks at a construction site of Kathmandu-Nijgadh fast track at Bandare Kholchha, where excavators are cutting the hillside to make way for the expressway.
A signboard lies on the ground near the site of the Lendanda tunnel construction.
A dirt track opened at Godawari Municipality in Lalitpur.
A view of the worker living quarters and machine parking area at Bandare Kholchha.
A view of the track opened at Dakshinkali Municipality, Kathmandu.
A temporary base for Nepal Army soldiers working for the fast track project at Makawanpurgadhi Rural Municipality, Makawanpur.
A view of Khokana village in Lalitpur, whose residents have been opposing the fast track that passes through their land.
 opening coming from Kathmandu side "fast track tunnel work")
A worker welds a metal frame for the fast track at Bakaiya Rural Municipality, Makawanpur.
Shikali Temple at Khokana, Lalitpur, which the Nepal Army had previously planned to move to make way for the fast track. The plan was withdrawn following local protests.
