The project costing Rs 70 million will benefit 900 households
GORKHA, June 21: A drinking water facility has been built in Palungtar Municipality of Gorkha with an investment of Rs 70.35 million.
Around 900 households in wards 4 and 5 of the municipality will benefit from the Chepe Khola Drinking Water Project. Drinking Water and Sanitation Division Office implemented the project with co-investment of locals.
The project will distribute clean drinking water to locals of Kumal Gau, Naya Gau, Alka Chilaune, Thati Pokhari, Majhtar, Magar Gau and Tallo Phant settlements.
Before the project started supplying clean drinking water, the main market area of Palungtar was suffering from acute shortage of drinking water. The project first pumps water from the Chepe River, which lies 1800 meters below the village, to the collection grid chamber.
“We have built plain sedimentation tank, slow sand filter and roughing filter for treatment of water,” Man Bahadur Poudel, president of consumers' committee formed by the project's beneficiaries, said. “Three tanks having capacity of 300,000 liters each have been built to store treated water. Clean drinking water will be directly distributed to the households from these tanks.”
Ratna Lamichhane, chief of the Drinking Water and Sanitation Division Office, said that the project has a single lift system that can pump 10-15 liters of water per second. “The project has capacity to lift up to 2 million liters of water per day. It is sufficient to meet the existing demand,” Lamichhane added.
Locals have borne 30 percent of the project's cost, while the division office has invested 70 percent. Locals contributed working hours worth 17.5 percent of the project cost and made cash investment of 12.5 percent of the project cost.
Gorkha Construction had bagged the contract to construct the project in March, 2015.
Dilip Kumar Shrestha, project manager of Gorkha Construction, said that the project should have been completed one and half years ago. “Construction work should have completed by mid-April. But our work was affected by the 2015 earthquakes as well as the Indian blockade,” he added.
The contractor is currently laying down pipes to distribute water to over 900 households in the area.
The government has already announced to develop Palungtar as a smart and industrial city. The locals say that the drinking water project is a step forward toward developing Palungtar as a smart city.
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