RAILWAY

1.      INTRODUCTION

Nepal is a developing country with its low per capita GDP of USD 320. Four-fifth of its land form comprises of hills and mountains and 80 percent of its population live in the rural areas. Thirty percent of the people live below the poverty line and  45 % of the population are unable to read and write.  The rural areas lack minimum physical facilities. The major challenge for Government of Nepal is to provide adequate infrastructure to these remote and scattered settlements. Infra structure development in Nepal started during 1050. and until then Nepal had  no infrastructure linkages to the rest of the world . Since then, the government has been making efforts to provide increased access to education, transportation, communication, health services, electricity and other infrastructure services. Despite these efforts Nepal remains one of the poorest countries with poverty reduction as the major challenge. One of the most dominant challenges of Nepal is to develop the basic infrastructures to accelerate its pace of development. For this, transportation plays a vital role in the overall development and socio-economic transformation of a country. In Nepal, road transport has predominant role because it is the only means for public transportation except the limited air service to some part of the country which is not affordable to common people. Therefore, Road infrastructure serves as a backbone for an overall socio-economic development of Nepal.  Negligible length of Railways available in Nepal has diminished surprisingly in the last 4 decades. Janakpur Jainagar Railway which is a narrow gauge in poor condition is the only railway facility in Nepal . Since the overall development of Nepal is pivoted around Infrastructure development focussed at road transport and aimed at poverty reduction , Government of Nepal has its priority in this sub-sector.

Nepal is a small country in South East Asia which is situated between two giant nations China and India. Nepal is spread within 147,181squre kilometers. Land transportation is the mostly followed transportation route. Nearly 15,000 km road is paved all over the country and nearly over 10,000 km is unpaved end of the year  2012 In rainy season most of the rural transportations are affected because of the land sliding which is the major development challenge for Nepal.Transportation development speeds have a direct impact or influence in the entire development speed of a nation. In developing countries transportation plays even more vital role. Nepal is also a developing country with a lot of possibility of transformation to the better future. There are anonymous numbers of potential factors which could possibly help to face and overcome challenges. The main function of the transportation system is functioning as a transit as well as carrying the goods and passengers between the estinations. An excellent transportation infrastructure means providing the accessibility of all possible markets for the development of any destination. Development of all hospitality and leisure activities are practically close to the transportation terminals, in fact they are correlated each steps they pass through. Flow of tourist has been strongly growing up since past decade. Tourism is not only a business anymore; it has been developing as a culture. Making tourism as a culture is also the result of rapid growing transportation system.

2.      Aim 

The aim of my presentation is to give a short knowledge on “possibilities and challenges of railway development in nepal”

3.      Scope

Nepal is a small and beautiful country. The bio-diversity that exists across the narrow cross section of the country is quite vast. The water resources that are available here could be harnessed for global benefits. The friendly people here with a pride history could be of interest as a living museum to global visitors. The country has a tremendous amount of load shedding which needs to be removed in near future by constructing thousands of Megawatts of electricity. Government aims to provide by the year 2017 transportation facilities to its people in a maximum of 2 hours and four hours walk in plains and hills respectively. Thousands of Kilometres of good standard roads need to be constructed to achieve this target.

Therefore there is the need of time to study some of these very burning questions:

3.1       What is the Status of Road Development in Nepal?

3.2       What are the possibilities of railway development in Nepal?

3.3       What are merits and demerits of railway development in Nepal?

 3.4      What are the challenges of railway development in Nepal?

These research problems will be endeavored to solve analytically.

4.      Status of Road development in Nepal

Road development in Nepal started only after the advent of democracy in 1950. The first motorable road was constructed in the Kathmandu Valley by the then Rana rulers in 1924.  The 42 km all weather gravel road between Amlekhganj to Bhimphedi was the first road of its kind constructed in 1929 outside the Kathmandu valley. The first long distance road to link Kathmandu with the Terai was taken up in 1953 with Indian assistance. This 115 km long road between Thankot (Kathmandu) and Bhainse(Makawanpur)  was opened to traffic in 1956. The National Road Network comprises of National Highways, Feeder roads, Urban roads, District roads and Village roads. The National Highways together with the Feeder roads constitute the Strategic Road Network (SRN) of the country. The Strategic Road Network is the backbone of the National Road Network. The construction and maintenance of the strategic roads fall on the responsibility of the Department of Roads.

The district roads together with village roads constitutes the District Road Network. At present the National Road Network has altogether 24000 km (30% blacktop, 27% gravel and 43% earthen roads) in 2008. The strategic, urban and local roads share 32.5%, 13% and 54.5% respectively in the National Road Network. 

The Strategic Road Network serves as the backbone of the National Road Network. The strategic roads have high traffic volume in comparison to district roads. There are 15 National Highways and 51 Feeder roads totalling 8000 km in the Strategic Road Network. The government plans to increase the length of SRN to 12000 km by the year 2017. 

Local Road Network (LRN), comprises of  District Roads, those urban roads not included in SRN, village roads,  agriculture roads, mule trails and tracks, Trail Bridges, Ropeway  etc. With the advent of Multiparty democracy in 1989, there has been a tremendous demand of constructing roads in rural areas. Though there are District Transport Master Plans prepared by the districts the growth of LRN is quite haphazard.  

Road development status of Nepal is not satisfactory compared to the south Asian countries. Nepal has a very low road density of 6.39 km per 100 sq km thus indicating poor accessibility to various parts of the country. At the end of first year of eleventh plan 6 district head quarters namely Bajura, Dolpa, Mugu, Humla, Manang, Solukhumbu are still lacking road connection. The Eleventh plan aims to road link the 3 district headquarters namely Bajura, Manang and Solukhumbu this year and the remaining three headquarters by the end of the eleventh plan that is 2010.

5.      Possibilities of railway development in Nepal

In order to meet the growing passenger and freight transport demand, Government of Nepal has long felt the necessity of development of railway as an alternative land transport mode for faster and cheaper movement of freight and passenger traffic. In pursuance to the objective, GoN through consultants has completed the Detailed Project Report for constructing proposed new Railway lines in Nepal which include Bardibas- Simara, Simara – Tamsariya and Tamsariya – Butwal of Mechi- Mahakali Railway (945 km). Recently the final report presentation for Simara – Tamsariya took place.

Ministry of Physical Infrastructure and Transport, Government of Nepal hence plans to conduct  Feasibility Study of Nijgadh – Hetauda - Bharatpur Electrified Railway Line with a view to introduce high speed rail system. Budget for this work has already been allocated in this F.Y. 2071/072.

6.      Merits and demerits of railway development in Nepal

Transportation brings more opportunities to the regions which are congested, intermediate and underdeveloped which is more beneficial in comparison to the other urban areas and developed areas. To develop such areas economic overhead capital should be concentrated seriously so that the achievement would be higher. Economic aspect of such areas will be growing eventually. Basically railway investment always affects the whole economic movement. The trends of railway development have been more focused to the urban areas which are leading the extremely undeveloped regions to be remaining the same. Basic theory for railway investment: ‚unless implemented the effect of transportation will be higher and higher”

Here are few advantages regarding railway development.

·         Development of Agriculture:

Spread of Railways in Nepal will contribute a great deal to the development of agriculture. Before the development of Railways, agriculture was largely subsistence-oriented. Railways have commercialized it. Our farmers do not produce for self-consumption only but also for sale in the market.

·         New Sources and New Areas of Production:

Railways will installe new sources and new areas of production. They will not only provide knowledge of the new areas, but also help in reaching the inaccessible areas.

·         Growth of Markets and Specialization:

Railways will extend the size of market and thus stimulated the process of specialization. Bulky goods can easily be transported by Railways.

·         Help in the Internal Trade:

By joining together different areas of the country, railways will make  internal trade convenient. They carry goods and passengers to distant places easily.

·         Mobility of Labour and Capital:

Railways will  increase the mobility of labor  and capital which in its turn will contribute  to the rapid industrialization of the country.

·         Employment:

Railways will be an important source of employment in Nepal. Lakhs of skilled and unskilled people will be employed in operating the railways. In addition, this means of transport  creates so many opportunities of employment.

·         Encouragement to Tourism:

Tourist traffic will also be encouraged. Railways sell circular tickets to the tourists and thereby promote tourism.

The Disadvantages of Railway Transport  are as Follows:

·         Loss of Goods:

Because goods in bulk quantities are carried chances of goods getting lost are high in case of railway transport as compared to air and road transport.

·         Unsafe for Fragile Items:

Railway transportation is particularly unsafe for carrying fragile items like glass because these items can easily break at times when a train halts unexpectedly of when the train is speeding up at times.

·         Late Bookings:

Because railway is the cheapest medium of transport, it is hard to find suitable bookings for the transportation of your goods. Railway transport is not suitable in cases of emergency.

·         Unsuitable for Short Distances:

Railway transport is unsuitable for carrying goods at shorter distances; road transport is most suitable in this case.

7.      Challenges of Railway development in Nepal

When it comes to implementing national pride projects, there has always been slow progress due to multiple problems, including land acquisition, lack of coordination among government agencies and government apathy. The Mechi-Mahakali Electric Railway, also known as East-West railway, is one of the 21 national priority projects that aims to connect Kakarbhitta in the east with Gaddachowki in the west.

It is a mega project and despite being a national pride project, we aren’t getting support from other governmental agencies to speed up work related to it. We have limited staff and there’s also lack of training for capacity building of officials, as railway development is new to us. Basically, we are in a phase of preparing detailed project report (DPR) of different sections. And, we’re hopeful that we’ll be able to spend around 80 per cent of the Rs 1.4 billion budget allocated for the current fiscal by year-end.

Problems related to big projects need to be addressed from the prime ministerial level. We are likely to face problems in track bed construction as contractors are supposed to collect 80 per cent of construction materials like stone and soil from local rivers, as per the contract signed with them. Many rivers also require environmental impact assessment (EIA) to dig soil there. Bardibas-Simara alignment also passes through a protected forest area. Since the railway project is a huge national project, there must be support from the general people, political parties and other government offices to resolve problems, mainly related to land acquisition and alignment dispute. Everyone should realise that the whole concept of the project is to develop a cheaper alternative mode of transport.

Topographical challenges are the main problem to the new constructions. Nepal faces several kinds of challenges to develop surface transportation. Fragile geology, numerous rivers crossings are the main issues with the development of roads. Nepal is facing several problems such as; infrastructure development in rugged topography and fragile geology complicated by high seismicity and big rivers, lack of skillful manpower, lack of political stabilities and unbelievable prolonged transition phases, inadequate maintenance, awareness of sustainability,  corruption, harsh competition with the membership of WTO etc.

Railways being the largest public sector undertaking has varied and complex problems. Some of them are as under:

1. Railway network is overburdened and inadequate to meet the new challenges of a fast developing economy.

2. Some regions are beyond the reach of railways due to unfavourable geographical conditions.  These areas need to be opened to railways for removing regional inequalities in economic growth.

3. Railways are facing stiff competition from road transport and thus its share in passenger and goods traffic is declining.

4. Railways are overburdened with surplus staff on its regular pay roles. This burden hinders the further development of railways.

5. The railways have to develop uneconomic projects due to political pressures and interferences.

6. Railways have huge outstanding payments to diesel and electric power supply companies.

7. Railways are the largest consumer of diesel. Any increase in the rates of diesel, adversely affect the financial resources.

8. Most of the equipment used by the railways are  now obsolete and need immediate replacements.

9. There is mounting deficit due to non increase in fares and tariffs by the Government due to political reasons.

Despite these problems and shortcomings, there is no other substitute for railways, as these are 5 times more energy efficient and four times more economical than railway transport. In the last few years, some administrative changes have been implemented to reduce the deficit.

8.      CONCLUSION

Nepal has been able to expedite its infrastructure development in the last two decades. This has made it possible that all the district headquarters would be road linked within next two years. Infrastructure including Road transport is seen as a vital tool towards poverty reduction. People have shown their keen interest towards infrastructure development in their areas. The donor support towards infrastructure development is increasing over the last few decades which have been instrumental to shape the road network of Nepal to present status. Legal provisions such as Acts, Regulations, plans and policies are in place to create enabling environment. The private sectors are willing to put their investment to infrastructure sector once the political stability is restored. Rapid progress of China and India, the two big neighbours could benefit Nepal from their development. The opportunity for infrastructure development is therefore, quite high in Nepal. Capacity building of both the consulting and construction industry is required in order to shoulder this responsibility mostly from within the nation.  The past efforts and experiences have revealed that there are some constraints to develop basic infrastructure. The funding has always remained as a key issue. Haphazard and non engineered construction has raised serious concerns towards the sustainability of already opened track roads. The quality control has not received due emphasis in some of the infrastructure developments in the past. These issues need to be addressed well as the country moves towards ‘construction of New Nepal’. With these opportunities and challenges Nepal has put its highest priority towards the extension of its road network Together with the donor support, mobilisation of internal resources including private funding and asset maintenance priority the scope for infrastructure development is tremendous. Based on the past experiences it is believed that poverty reduction would be realised through adequate, safe and sound road network. For the development of necessary infrastructure Engineers role is very vital. So, the role of consulting engineers for building new Nepal is of utmost importance. Nepalese consulting Industry together with the construction industry here should develop themselves side by side so as to shoulder this responsibility that the time is going to put on to them.