Maladunga-Beni Road Upgraded to Double Lane Under Kaligandaki Corridor Project

Myagdi. The Maladunga-Beni road, which connects Myagdi and Mustang to the national highway, has been upgraded. Under the national pride Kaligandaki Corridor (Beni-Jomsom-Korala) road project, which connects China and India, the Maladunga-Beni road has been widened to two lanes, 11 meters wide, and paved with asphalt technology.

Apex-Khadka-Krishna JV had signed a contract in Chaitra 2077 for Rs 52.86 crore to construct the 13-kilometer road connecting Maladunga in Kushma Municipality-1, Parbat, through wards 8, 7, 4, and 3 of Jaljala Rural Municipality, to Beni, the district headquarters of Myagdi, into a two-lane road and pave it.

Project Chief Tejaswi Sharma stated that paving and concreting have been completed on all sections except for 960 meters of the thirteen-kilometer stretch. "Painting and safety infrastructure installation are underway on the completed paved and concreted road," he said. "The 760 meters in Waribeni, and one hundred meters each in Kerabari and Pharase landslide areas have been excluded from the contract."

Project Chief Sharma explained that the sections were removed from the contract due to disagreements with homeowners regarding road expansion in the middle of the settlement in Waribeni, and due to landslides in Pharase and Kerabari. The target for completion was the year 2079 BS.

The main contractor returned to the worksite a year ago to complete the project, which had been abandoned by the subcontractor Omkareshwar, citing delays due to the Corona pandemic, floods, landslides, and a shortage of river-based construction materials.

Previously, 3 kilometers and 300 meters of the Maladunga-Pharase section were paved, and 2 kilometers and 200 meters were concreted last year. Engineer Jivan Chaudhary from the construction company stated that the work to pave the six kilometers and 500 meters of the Lasti-Beni section, which began in the first week of last Maghsir, has been completed and is currently being surveyed by the technical team.

Local residents of Myagdi, Mustang, and Jaljala Rural Municipality in Parbat, as well as tourists and pilgrims, use this road. The Maladunga-Beni road, which was first opened in 2052 BS under the 'Food for Work' program, was one-way paved in 2068 BS. As traffic volume increased after Mustang and the Korala border were connected to the road network, this narrow road had recently become dilapidated.

Transport entrepreneur Buddhi Pun stated that the travel time on the Maladunga-Beni road, which previously took an hour, has been reduced to 15 to 20 minutes after the upgrade. "For the last five years, we have been using the winding alternative route via Beni-Ratnechaur-Baglung-Maladunga for travel between Pokhara and Beni," he said. "The problem of having to travel on the winding road has been eliminated, and the travel time has also been shortened."

Baburam Karki, a resident of Milan Chowk in Jaljala Rural Municipality-7, said that with the road paving, the situation of having to endure risky and arduous travel through dust and mud has ended.