Manang, Feb. 19: The blacktopping of 7.8 kilometres road section of the Dumre-Besisahar-Chame Road, the only road network connecting Manang district, has been completed.

 The construction work of the Dumre-Besisahar-Chame Road Project was started by the Road Division Office, Tanahun, in 1991, according to the government’s plan to connect Manang with the road network. 

Kiran Pokhrel, an engineer and information officer at the Dumre Besisahar-Chame Road Project office, said that only 700 metres of the road was left to be blacktopped. He said that 85 per cent of the work had been completed with expenditures totaling Rs.190 million. 

According to the road project office, a contract for the project is expected to cost approximately Rs. 520 million, but the contract was awarded at Rs. 253.2 million in June 2021. However, due to the monsoon, construction work began only in September of the same year. Since the work could not be completed within the deadline, the contract was extended till July 2024.

Meanwhile, the construction of the road was handed over to the then Nepali Army in 2000 after the construction work was halted due to various reasons.  Out of the 65-kilometres-long road, 35 kilometres lie in Lamjung and 30 kilometres in Manang. 

Sub-engineer Suman Adhikari said that the construction work on the Manang section could not make progress rapidly due to excessive cold in winter. 

He said that the work would be accelerated with the onset of summer. 

Almost 29 years after the track was opened, the road section in Lamjung is being blacktopped by using American technology called Asphalt Paving Technology.