The Bhutanese Leading the way.
The construction of a 10.5 KM farm road to Toktogom in Bongo gewog, Chukha, began on January 16, after a waiting period of almost a year because of a lack of funds.
It is an activity that is not listed in the 11th plan because the Chiwog does not qualify for a road as it has too few households. There are 17 households in Toktogom with 130 people and six households of Getala with 90 people.
Home minister Lyonpo Dawa Gyaltshen who was at inaugural ceremony said “Nevertheless, knowing the difficulty people face and knowing the fact that it hampers agricultural production, we decided to go ahead with the construction,” he said “We not only took a decision but the Thimphu Thrizin and Thimphu Dzongda were also involved as one chiwog from their dzongkhag will also benefit from the construction,” the minister said.
Since it was not included in 11 FYP they had to look for other sources and managed to get Nu 1 million.
Chukha dzongkhag Thrizin Tshering Nidup said the road will also benefit the people of Getala chiwog and Dagala gewog under Thimphu Dzongkhag. “The discussion on this matter was started in February 2017 whereby Lyonpo Dawa Gyaltshen and Lyonpo Leki Dorji supported the discussion,” he said.
He said they had to wait almost a year to start construction because there was no budget. “To start the construction we only have Nu 1.5 million for now whereby Nu 1 million was organized by Lyonpo Dawa Gyaltshen and Nu 0.5 million was donated by Thimphu Dzongkhag,” Tshering Nidup said. “It won’t be enough to construct a road and this is why we will be including this matter in a 12 FYP to finish up work. Chukha Plant has said that they will donate some amount and we were asked to give them an estimate so that they can put up to their board.”
The road will benefit the people in many ways, especially in agriculture. “They cultivate potato but not in bulk as they have to carry it to the road point. Since they have a transportation issue, they prefer to leave their land and move to Toktowom as that chiwog has a road access,” said Tshering Nidup.
Chukha dzongkhag today has 411.01 km of farm roads of which 210.62 km was constructed in the current plan.
