Longest, tallest suspension bridge to open soon

BY OUR CORRESPONDENT

Myagdi, Nov. 9: The longest and tallest suspension bridge connecting Myagdi with Baglung district is at its final stage. The construction work of the bridge from Ratnechaur of Beni Municipality-1 to Kundule of Baglung Municipality-4 has been accelerated in order to bring the bridge into operation within a month. The construction of the bridge was started a year ago.

An agreement was made last October with Thani Himsikhar JV to construct the 388-metre long and 70-metre tall bridge within 10 months at a cost of Rs. 30,000,000. According to the agreement, the construction has been delayed by four months.

Resham Bogati, a local, said that the bridge would shorten the travel distance of one hour to five minutes. He added that the people who could afford used to travel to Baglung by vehicles but people who could not pay vehicle fare used to reach Baglung by walking for around one and a half hours. He said that it would be very easy to take patients to Baglung for treatment, for common people to go to market for shopping and students for study. 

Tek Bahadur Rawal, the former ward chair of Beni Municipality-1, said that it is believed internal tourism would be promoted due to the long bridge. He said that after the construction of Ratnechaur bridge, which has gone viral on social media recently, the possibility of further tourism development would open up. It is expected that the bridge would play an important role for the development of religious and tourist areas, ease travel and distribution of the goods produced in both districts in the market. 

Once the bridge comes into operation, it would be easier to travel to the religious and tourist sites of Baglung and mountains including the Panchkot Shaalgram Museum of Baglung. 

For the construction of the bridge, residents of Kundule, Banpa-4, Jailal Sapkota, Indra Sharma and Pashupati Sapkota and others had provided about one and a half ropanis of land in Bhujelchaur.