India starts survey on road to dry port in Nepal

The central government has initiated the survey for a 4.5 km-long four-lane road connecting Dodhara Chandani dry port in Nepal. The port, which is located south of river Sharda, will directly connect Banbasa in Champawat district of Uttarakhand on the Indian side. The project has been in the pipeline for the past few years and has been getting delayed for various reasons. In 2016, Nepal had started construction of the dry port at Dodhara Chandani village in the Kanchanpur district of Sudurpashchim Pradesh and about 100-acre land was acquired and the primary cost of the dry port was put at 5,000 crore Nepali rupees. India had agreed to give four-lane road access to the port through national highway (NH) 9 at Banbasa, SDM Tanakpur. Himanshu Kafaltia informed that NHAI had surveyed a 4.5-km-long road from Jagbuda bridge to border pillar 11 for the project. Around 21-hectare land will be acquired for the project of which 13-hectare is forest land and 8-hectare is personal. NHAI has sent a proposal for forest land clearance to the divisional forest officer (DFO), Khatima, and a joint survey of forest and NHAI officials will be completed shortly. The project will have two bridges, one on the rail line and another on a canal.