. It has been more than two weeks since the government started claiming that there is no shortage of LPG in the market. Officials from the Ministry of Industry, Commerce and Supplies to the Nepal Oil Corporation (NOC) have been repeatedly claiming that the import and supply of LPG is regular.
} The government has been directing the businessmen not to engage in black marketing. The government claims that it has also intensified market monitoring. The Minister of Industry, Commerce and Supplies herself has reached the depot and is monitoring it. The government has formed a ‘Quick Response Team’ to listen to the complaints of consumers. The hotline number has been made public. However, the market situation has not returned to normal. Consumers are not able to get gas.
Consumers across the country have been standing in queues since midnight with empty cylinders.TAG_OPEN_div_120 Not only Kathmandu Valley, consumers from Surkhet to Jumla are compelled to stand in queue for hours carrying gas cylinders. In some places, people are compelled to reach the depots in the middle of the night to get gas. Many consumers complain that they have not been able to get gas in the Kathmandu Valley, have to wait for hours and return with empty cylinders.
The scene seen at Sagarmatha Traders and Suppliers in Birendranagar Municipality-6 of Surkhet on Sunday depicts the real situation of LPG supply.TAG_OPEN_div_118 Consumers have been queuing up with LPG cylinders since 2 am. The line remains.
Similarly, Luna Suppliers at Chandannath Municipality-6 in Jumla district has seen a long queue for cooking gas on Sunday.TAG_OPEN_div_116 Waiting for hours with cylinders has become a normal routine for the consumers there.
Dhankuta monitoring after gas shortage: Photo: RSS
These examples occurred outside the Kathmandu Valley. There is no dearth of people standing in queues due to lack of gas in the valley. Now the general public and even the leaders of the RSP have started complaining about the lack of gas supply.TAG_OPEN_span_69
Rastriya Samajwadi Party (RSP) lawmaker Ramesh Prasain has questioned whether there is a shortage of cooking gas in the parliament building and whether there is a shortage of gas in the prime minister’s quarters or not.TAG_OPEN_div_110
RSP-backed lawmaker Bhojraj Thapa wrote on Facebook, “It’s been 10 days since we ran out of gas.TAG_OPEN_div_108 The gas is not old. Where do we complain? If you want to eat, you will eat it! They say that you are not ringing the bell in the election. No one has any complaints. I am silent. “
There are millions of consumers who suffer from such problems. On the one hand, consumers are in such a situation. On the other hand, the government is claiming that there is no shortage of gas in the market.
} The government is ignoring the queue of people who do not get gas in the vicinity of the depot.
Gas shortages are increasing across the country.TAG_OPEN_div_104 The government has been urging consumers not to panic, claiming that there is no shortage of cooking gas in the market since July 24.
Minister for Industry, Commerce and Supplies, Gauri Kumari Yadav, on July 26, clarified that there was no shortage of LPG in the market.TAG_OPEN_div_102 “We have been receiving complaints from consumers about the shortage of cooking gas in the market for the past few days. I have started working on this subject with special interest. ” she had issued a statement.
Stating that the Ministry was monitoring the stock and supply situation of LPG, Yadav urged consumers not to panic.TAG_OPEN_div_100 She urged the general public to purchase gas in the required quantity for the time being and not to hoard it unnecessarily, keeping in mind the situation arising in course of the gas distribution.
On the occasion, Minister Yadav directed the Nepal Oil Corporation (NOC) to ease the supply chain by immediately resolving the problem seen in the market.TAG_OPEN_div_98 The corporation had said that the market monitoring and distribution system would be made more systematic. But even after that, the suffering of the consumers did not subside.
On July 2 TAG_OPEN_div_96 6, Minister Yadav himself went to inspect the gas industry. She inspected the Surya Gas Industry and Sagarmatha Gas Industry in Kavre and inquired about the supply and distribution of gas.
The industrialists had claimed that the supply of gas was smooth as in the past. Industrialists said that there is a shortage in the market as consumers are buying more gas than they need.
User on a gas line in Karnali Photo: RSS
On the occasion, Minister Yadav directed the government officials to distribute and sell cooking gas prioritizing domestic purpose rather than commercial purpose to avoid shortage of LPG.TAG_OPEN_div_92 At that time, the government had cited distribution and consumer behavior as one of the reasons for the problem rather than the shortage of gas. But the consumer experience in the market was different.
On August 1, the government has introduced another special provision to provide relief to the consumers. Nepal Oil Corporation (NOC) has started distributing LPG from its office in Teku following the directive of Minister Yadav. On that day also, the NOC was supplying LPG gas as per its daily demand, according to the Ministry’s Secretariat.
In order to ease the supply of LPG, the distribution of the new brand of LPG, which is in high demand in the Kathmandu Valley, started from the Nepal Oil Corporation office in Teku from August 30.TAG_OPEN_div_88 Arrangements have been made to sell cylinders of Nepal Gas, HP Gas, Everest Gas, Sagoon Gas and Shree Ram Gas from 11:00 am to 5:00 pm.
Consumers were also urged to contact the corporation’s hotline number 01-5971902 within office hours in case they did not get gas.TAG_OPEN_div_86 At a time when the government is saying that the supply is regular, the system of selling gas from the NOC office proves that there is a shortage of gas.
On August 2 TAG_OPEN_div_84, the Ministry of Industry, Commerce and Supplies issued a press release stating that there was no shortage of cooking gas in the market. The Ministry claimed that the import of cooking gas was more than the demand, black marketing was being monitored in the market and the supply system was regular. The government and the Oil Corporation, which claims that the demand for cooking gas has been imported, instructed the consumers not to stock more than the requirement. This also shows that there is a problem in the market even though the government has said that the gas has been supplied as per the requirement.
The Ministry of TAG_OPEN_div_82 Industry, Commerce and Supplies has appealed to the Ministry of Home Affairs to resolve the problem seen in the market. Monitoring has been tightened in gas depots and markets in coordination with the Ministry of Industry, Commerce and Supplies and the Ministry of Home Affairs. The government has mobilized police personnel in plain clothes to control black marketing in the market. However, the complaints of consumers have not stopped due to long queues and lack of gas.
The government also formed a ‘Quick Response Team’ to solve the problem.TAG_OPEN_div_80 Following the directive of Industry Minister Yadav, Nepal Oil Corporation (NOC) has formed a mechanism comprising representatives from the Ministry of Industry, Nepal Oil Corporation, Department of Industries and LPG entrepreneurs. Other members in the team are Mangal Bista from the Ministry of Industry, Indu Shrestha and Upendra Subedi from Nepal Oil Corporation, Aayush Nepal and Kul Prasad Rai from LPG industry.
On Saturday, Industry Minister Gauri Kumari Yadav visited the Nepal Gas Industry (NGL) after receiving complaints from consumers that cooking gas was not available in an easy manner.TAG_OPEN_div_78 She visited the gas distribution depot in Teku and inspected the distribution situation. She also directed all LPG distribution companies to distribute cooking gas in priority to the students as there is a large number of students in Kirtipur area of Kathmandu. On Sunday, Minister Yadav said that he was monitoring the supply of cooking gas in various places.
Consumers queue up with gas cylinders in Jumla on Sunday. Photo: RSS
Nagendra Shah has been appointed as the executive officer of Nepal Oil Corporation (NOC).TAG_OPEN_div_75 He was sworn in on Thursday. The issue of gas shortage and supply management was also raised during the swearing-in of the new CEO. The government is hopeful that the gas supply system will improve after the new leadership comes in office. But so far, the problem faced by the consumers is still there.
The government has been claiming that the supply has been regular during this period of gas crisis. According to the government, there is no problem in the import of gas from India, gas is being imported more than the demand and the supply from the industries is regular. However, the problem seen in the market since the first week of July has not been resolved yet.
Although the government has been mobilizing mechanisms at various levels to resolve the problem, there are still complaints about the shortage of gas in the market.TAG_OPEN_div_71 According to the government, more than two hundred complaints have been received daily through the ‘Quick Response’ system. The government has been distributing around 40,000 cylinders of cooking gas in a day in the Kathmandu Valley alone.
प्रतिक्रिया दिनुहोस्