Economy, Market Watch

Lower Modi I – Citizen Bank along with 7 Banks Invest

Published by Octron on August 9, 2009

While, the first model Hydropower project Chilime seems to be dwindling between locales demand & Supreme Court for its IPO release, another hydropower project Lower Modi I (10 Mw) is being proposed by the Nepali investors. Modi I will be the first company to have investors, research team, contractors & consultants from Nepal. The total cost of this project is being estimated to be 1 Billion and 650 Million Rupees. The project duration is planned to 22 months. Lower Modi I will be the most promising and critical project for Nepal and its investors, not just because of its estimation of cost and duration, but also due to huge investment from the private commercial banks group.

75% of total project cost will borrowed from local commercial banks, led by Citizen International Bank Ltd. Following banks, apart from Citizen International Bank will be lending money for the project; Global Bank, KIST, Clean Energy Development Bank, NDEP, NCC, Vibor Vikas Bank & NSM. Taking into consideration of current socio-political state of the country, the project might be in high risk. The frequent bandhs, strikes by labor & unions, road blockades will be the major problems for the completion of the project in such short time. For e.g. Chilime was delayed more than 2 years, so was Maydhya Marsyangdhi (70 MW), which was delayed for four years. The delay in the project will just increase the total project cost, so will the spiking inflation rate upon the raw materials & commodities.

Mahendra Bahadur Karki, CEO for the project cleared the air by saying;

As soon as the construction work begins, we will stock everything from construction materials like; rods, sand, bricks, rocks to food for the workers, so that we won’t have to stop the work even a single day be it Hadtal, Chakkajams or Bandh !

The answer looks promising, when we Nepali’s can work 16 hours a day like a machine in the foreign land for few dollars, why can’t we work hard enough to develop our own country and save millions of dollars being paid to in buying electricity from India. The initiative taken by commercial banks by investing in hydropower is very commendable, after all how long can a bank progress with EMIs, Car Loans, Housing Loans, and Complexes & Shopping Malls when the country lacks even basic infrastructure like electricity.

All the investors and citizens of this country pleads the current government, opposition leaders, local groups, labor unions to stop their petty antics by calling strikes,bandhs which just hinders the development of this country. Lets all think and act rationally like a civilized citizen and help in development of this democratic country.

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