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Member of the House of Representatives Eng. Deepak Kumar Sah has urged the government to immediately remove administrative hurdles affecting national pride projects, stating that effective implementation of the budget is even more important than its formulation.

Speaking at a meeting of the House of Representatives, Sah said that although budget allocation processes in previous years had often been influenced by political and regional pressures, he viewed this year’s budget as a positive document prepared with the nation’s actual needs and sustainable development at its core.

Recalling remarks made by the Chairperson of the Rastriya Swatantra Party, the Prime Minister, and the Finance Minister during the budget preparation process, he said, “To establish a proper system and advance the grand mission of nation-building, we must rise above the narrow mindset of concentrating budgets solely on our own constituencies and move forward with a broader vision focused on increasing the country’s overall productivity.”

However, Sah stressed that good policies and budgets alone do not change realities on the ground and cited the Hetauda–Dhalkebar–Duhabi 400 kV Transmission Line Project, a national pride project, as an example.

He noted that most of the work on the strategically important project, being constructed through joint investment by the Government of Nepal and the Nepal Electricity Authority (NEA), has already been completed, with only the stringing of conductors on 18 towers remaining. However, the project has nearly come to a standstill because approval for tree felling has not been granted along a roughly 12-kilometer section passing through forest areas. He added that even if approval is received after the onset of the monsoon season, construction work would become difficult.

Referring to Point No. 48 of the government’s 100-point governance reform agenda, which set a target of completing the project within 100 days, Sah remarked that it reflects the height of administrative irresponsibility that final approval for tree felling has still not been granted despite more than 785 days having passed since the submission of the revised Initial Environmental Examination (IEE) report.

According to him, the country is suffering direct economic losses of around NPR 4 billion annually due to the absence of officials and the tendency for files to remain stalled on various desks for years under the pretext of seeking additional consultations.

In this context, Sah presented three clear demands to the government. First, the tree-felling approval process for the Hetauda–Dhalkebar–Duhabi 400 kV Transmission Line Project should be completed immediately without further delays or excuses. Second, an impartial investigation should be conducted into why a nationally important file remained pending for 785 days, and responsible officials should be held legally accountable. Third, a single-window approval system with fixed timelines should be introduced to resolve such administrative bottlenecks in national pride projects.

Citing neighboring India as an example, he noted that forest clearance processes for nationally important transmission line, road, and railway projects have been integrated into an online system, with cases automatically escalated to higher authorities if decisions are not made within the prescribed timeframe. He said Nepal could adopt similar best practices.

Sah emphasized that public administration must become results-oriented rather than process-oriented, adding that budget preparation itself is not the ultimate achievement; successful implementation is the crucial link.

Urjasanchar