An Indian villager burrowed for 14 years with a hammer and chisel to cut a tunnel through a mountain so that he could park his truck outside his home.
Ramchandra Das, 53, who lives in eastern Bihar state, carved a tunnel through the hill range from his village of Kewati. Das took up the task after villagers found the trek over the mountain increasingly arduous.
When the authorities refused to help, Das began carving his way through the earth in the direction of the nearest big town, Atri. The job became more pressing when Das became the first man to own a truck in the village and was unable to drive it to his home.
“I could not park my truck near my house since the mountain blocked my path,” he said. Das said he was also afraid of bandits stealing his truck. “I had to leave my truck miles away, so I decided to do something about it myself,” Das said by telephone.
Local villagers, who previously had to trek around the mountain, are now using the tunnel to get to work.
Das was inspired by another Bihari villager, Dasharath Manjhi, who cut a passage so that villagers could reach a local hospital.
A local official says, “we rarely come across a man who can work so hard to achieve his goal.”
No word on whether than man will charge a toll for passage through the tunnel.
