Extreme cold halts development works in Mustang

लगानी न्यूज

२९ पुष २०८२, मंगलवार ०७:२४January 13, 2026

Mustang. Development works in the mountainous district of Mustang have come to a halt due to extreme cold.

With the increasing cold in the winter season, the infrastructure development works being implemented in all the five local levels of Mustang have come to a standstill.TAG_OPEN_div_43

Project Chief Tejaswi Sharma said the road and bridge construction project under the Beni-Jomsom-Korala road section has been affected due to extreme cold.÷TAG_OPEN_div_41 Due to the extreme cold, the equipment used in the development works also gets stranded. He said that the construction work on the Mustang section of Korala road has been halted before mid-January.

Sharma said that the construction of cold-hit infrastructure in Mustang under the Korala road section of national pride would resume after mid-April.TAG_OPEN_div_39 According to him, the up-gradation of 9.8-km Kagbeni-Chusang road, which was awarded the contract for the Korala road in the current fiscal year, has been halted due to cold. The project had agreed to pay Rs 28.87 crore for blacktopping the Kagbeni-Chusang road.

According to the project, the construction of a 40-meter long Ghami Khola bridge that connects Korala border point has been halted due to cold weather.TAG_OPEN_div_37 Himdhunga Thokkar and Emotel JV Construction had signed the contract at a cost of Rs 68 million but the construction of the bridge has been delayed. The foundation was constructed in Ghami Khola, which has reached 80 percent of the physical progress. According to Sharma, the construction of the bridge has been halted due to the extreme cold.

Similarly, the 17-TAG_OPEN_div_35 km road from Kowang of Thasang rural municipality-2 to Jomsom-4 of Gharpajhong-4 under the Beni-Jomsom-Korala road, a national pride project, has also been obstructed due to cold.

Although the construction of asphalt blacktopping road was started in 2073÷74 BS after signing a contract agreement, the construction work has not been completed due to the dilly-dallying of the construction company.TAG_OPEN_div_33 However, only five kilometers of the road is yet to be blacktopped. Had the construction company stepped up its activism, the project was confident that the construction would have been completed before mid-January.

Likewise, the construction of Larjung River bridge and Kaiku river bridges at Thasang rural municipality along the Korala road has also been affected due to cold weather, said Sharma.TAG_OPEN_div_31 Dozens of development projects of federal, provincial offices and local levels have come to a halt due to extreme cold in Mustang. According to Jagadish Joshi, sub-engineer of Infrastructure Development Office, Mustang, 12 projects that are in the implementation phase of the old multi-year plan and 13 new projects added in the current fiscal year have been affected due to cold.

According to Sub-Engineer Joshi, although the cutting work is going on on the road leading to Albari in Gharpajhong-2, Marfa, most of the projects being implemented by the office had to be postponed due to cold.TAG_OPEN_div_29 The old multi-year projects have been stalled due to various reasons and some of them are in the construction phase but the work has not been done due to the cold. Among the new projects, three are in the multi-year process and some are in the tender process. Sub-engineer Joshi said that the infrastructure works could not be forwarded as the Nai project started after the contract was signed in winter.

With the extreme cold in Mustang, the cold has affected the construction of physical infrastructures at the Water Supply, Water Resources and Irrigation Sub-division Office, Annapurna Conservation Area Project (ACAP), Integrated Service Office, five local levels of Mustang and various organizations.TAG_OPEN_div_27 More than 50 small and big infrastructure projects are in implementation in each local level of the district. But all these plans have been stalled due to extreme cold.

Lomanthang Rural Municipality Chairman Tasinurb Gurung said that the development works could not be carried out even if they wanted to due to the risk of cold and snowfall in the winter season.TAG_OPEN_div_25 “The locals come to the valley in winter to escape the cold and they face similar problems to work in the cold,” said Gurung, adding, “Development works can be forwarded in the month of Baisakh after the cold subsides. ”

All the development projects in Gharpajhong, Thasang, Lomanthang and Loghekar Damodar Kunda rural municipalities have come to a halt due to the cold.TAG_OPEN_div_23 The temperature in Upper Mustang dropped to minus 20 degrees Celsius while the temperature in lower Mustang dropped to minus 10 degrees Celsius. Most of the government employees in Upper Mustang and Lower Mustang have also stopped living in the district. Security personnel from all three security bodies are deployed at the respective work sites to provide peace and security despite severe cold in Mustang. Although Upper Mustang is in a state of dishonor, the remote employees working there are waiting for the empty houses of the citizens.