KMC busy managing tangled cables in preparation for BIMSTEC summit

Kathmandu / Aug 9: Kathmandu Metropolitan City (KMC) has started managing the cables that are haphazardly lying on the street sides to spruce up the city in preparation for the upcoming BIMSTEC Summit.

The two-day summit meeting of the Bay of Bengal Initiative for Multi-Sectoral Technical and Economic Cooperation (BIMSTEC) is scheduled to commence in Kathmandu on August 30 .

An official at the Environment Management Department of KMC said they were removing all cables installed haphazardly on the electricity poles by various bodies as these tangled cables were spoiling the city’s beauty.

Various agencies had spoilt the face of the city by leaving the cables dangling and jumbled up on the electricity poles, Chief of the Work Operation Section at the Department, Meen Bahadur Thapa said while adding that “All these cables would be removed and only the ones that are installed in a neat and systematic way would be spared.”

The Department has speeded up its work of managing such cables in Putali Sadak, Pradarshani Marga, Lainchaur, way to Soaltee Hotel and places around the President Office.

KMC had started removing the unsystematic cables since last November but has now intensified it in view of the BIMSTEC Summit. So far, 65 mini-truck full of such cables has been removed. The highest volume of such cables includes the cables installed by the Internet Service Providers and telephone cables.

Thapa further said the unsystematic cables that were hanging loose from the poles and the useless cables also posed security risk to pedestrians. So they needed to be removed.

Collecting dust, keeping those throwing garbage haphazardly under surveillance, collecting cables thrown haphazardly in course of road extension, among others have become the regular job of the Department.

Ward Chairperson of KMC-16, Mukunda Rijal said that the KMC would manage the cables on the streets of Kathmandu in a systematic way as haphazardly installed cables was one of the factors spoiling the beauty of the city.

Nepal, India, Bangladesh, Myanmar, Thailand, Bhutan and Sri Lanka are the member countries of the BIMSTEC, established in 1997. Nepal joined this regional organisation in 2004. The first BIMSTEC summit was held in Thailand in 2004, second in India in 2008 and third in Myanmar in 2014. RSS