Fuel pumps operated by police, army sealed for cheating customers

KATHMANDU, JUN 28 -The government’s monitoring on fuel stations has shown even the pumps operated by the Nepal Army (NA) and the Nepal Police are involved in cheating customers.

A joint monitoring team of the government on Thursday sealed a diesel dispensing machine of Nepal Police’s Prahari Kalyan Kosh Petrol Pump in Naxal, Kathmandu, for providing customers with less amount of fuel than they pay for.

The monitoring team comprised of officials from the Department of Commerce and Supply Management, Commission for Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA) and Nepal Bureau of Standards Metrology (NBSM).

“Out of five fuel pumps of Nepal Police, one diesel pump has been sealed as it was found dispensing 30 ml less fuel on every 5-litre sales,” said Hari Narayan Belbase, director of the Commerce Department.

Earlier on Tuesday, Shakti Devi Petrol Pump operated by the army in Lagankhel, Lalitpur, was found selling less diesel and petrol than what customers pay for. The inspection team had prohibited the pump from fuel trading until the next notice. During the monitoring, the pump was found selling 50ml less diesel and 15-20ml less petrol on every 5-litre sales.

‘Paralysis’ at NTA puts entire telecom sector in chaos

KATHMANDU, JUN 28 -The Nepal Telecommuni-cations Authority ( NTA ) has been “paralysed” due to a series of controversial decisions by the government that have been regularly challenged at court.

All the tasks related to licence, tariff approval and new programmes have remained pending because the NTA has no chairman. Attempts to appoint a chief executive have been engulfed in disputes over the selection of ineligible candidates due to political pressure.

“Nothing important is happening except for normal administrative work so that the staff can get their monthly salaries,” said an NTA official. He added with the NTA ’s ad hoc board not being able to hold meetings, they had not been able to renew licence of internet service provider (ISP) Web Surfer and limited mobility licence of United Telecom Limited (UTL) for Morang and Sunsari.

Similarly, the NTA ’s annual programme for the next fiscal year, licence issuance to new network service providers (NSPs) and ISPs, tariff approval of Nepal Telecom and Ncell, licence scrapping of four ISPs who have remained out of contact, utilisation of the Rural Telecommuni-cation Development Fund (RTDF) in the district optical fibre plan, study for 4G spectrum auctioning and assignment of WiMax spectrum to ISPs, among others, have remained in limbo. NTA regulates and monitors more than 200 licensees.

EIR not implemented for cell phones even after three years

KATHMANDU, JUN 26 -The Equipment Identity Register (EIR) is yet to be implemented in the telecom sector three years after the government planned to enforce it. The Nepal Telecom-munications Authority (NTA) has been blaming telecom companies for the failure.

The EIR requires telecom companies to save and control the International Mobile Equipment Identity (IMEI), a unique number that is given to each mobile phone by the manufacturer. It is designed to prevent illegal call bypass, use of cell phones in criminal activities, theft of handsets and import of poor quality products.

In 2010, the Prime Minister’s Office had ordered the Ministry of Information and Communications and the NTA to implement the EIR system at the earliest. Last year, the NTA issued a directive to telecom companies to put it into action. However, phone companies have been ignoring the order and the NTA has never bothered to follow it up either. A senior ministry official said that reluctance on the part of telecom companies and phone dealers and the NTA’s inefficiency were to blame for the EIR not happening. “The regulation also promotes use of quality handsets imported through legal channels and approved by the NTA,” added the official.

Under the EIR, telecom companies can mark an IMEI as being invalid if a set is stolen or is not type approved, which will prevent it from being used. The system allows operators to verify the IMEIs, blacklist a device or trace illegal users. The EIR also helps to make compensation claims in case of injury or death due to a faulty mobile set.

China-aided Ring Road expansion begins

KATHMANDU, JUN 26 -It was built in the 1970s with with Chinese assistance. Now, after some 40 years, the expansion of the Ring Road is also being carried out with support from the northern neighbour.

The first phase of the Kathmandu Ring Road Improvement Project took off formally on Tuesday, Vice-president Paramananda Jha and visiting State Councillor of China Yang Jiechi jointly inaugurating the project.

The existing 27-km four-lane two-way road around Kathmandu will now be widened to eight lanes, with a two-way bicycle lane and a pedestrian pathway.

Addressing the inaugural programme, Minister for Physical Infrastructure and Transport Chhabi Raj Pant said the improved road would provide better by-pass service to inner roads and ease traffic pressure. “The road has been designed incorporating a bicycle lane and a pathway for pedestrians,” he said.

China’s Vice-Minister of Commerce Jiang Zengwei said the road witnessed tremendous changes in the last 30-40 years.“So we decided to undertake this improvement project,” he said.Nepal and China had signed and exchanged the Letters of Exchange for a Chinese grant of Rs 547 million for the widening of the Ring Road and other mutually agreed projects in February 2011.

Telephone service penetration hits 77.11pc

KATHMANDU, JUN 24 -Telephone service penetration rate has increased to 77.11 percent as of mid-May. The number of telephone lines distributed by telecom companies has reached 20.43 million.

The growth in the overall telecom subscriber base is largely driven by the rise in the number of mobile phone service users. Of the total users, 18.13 million are the users of cellular phone service, according to the Nepal Telecommunications Authority (NTA). Only Nepal Telecom (NT) and Ncell offer mobile phone service.

As per the NTA, Ncell’s customer base has increased to 10.09 million, while NT has 8.79 million users (including fixed line and limited mobility service). Rest is shared among four telecom companies — United Telecom Limited (UTL), Smart Telecom, Nepal Satellite Telecom and STM Telecom Sanchar.

NTA officials attributed the growth in the overall telecom service users to the rapid expansion of service network by telecom companies, growing spending power of the public, cheaper technology, and competition.

NT to start RUIM card distribution through bundling

KATHMANDU, JUN 23 -Nepal Telecom (NT) is preparing to distribute Removable User Identity Module (RUIM) cards under its IP CDMA project through bundling with new handset models from three brands—Micromax, Lenovo and Alcatel. The state-owned telecom company will soon sign an agreement with local dealers of the handsets.

The service bundling plan has come at the time when NT is facing shortage of IP CDMA technology-compatible mobile handsets in the market to expand its IP CDMA service which offers voice and high-speed wireless internet services. RUIM cards require separate smartphones that support voice and data services in the IP-CDMA network.

“We are planning to sign the agreement soon to start distribution of RUIM cards within a month,” said Anoop Ranjan Bhattarai, director at NT’s Wireless Telephone Directorate. He said the company is also working to make available USB dongle for high-speed internet in the IP-CDMA network.

Jewellers reaching out to political leaders

KATHMANDU, JUN 21 -With the government not getting bogging down by their pressure, jewellers have started lobbying with the political leaders to save fellow traders who were found involved in cheating consumers in weight and quality of jewellery products.

The representatives of two jewellers’ organisations—Federation of Nepal Gold and Silver Dealers’ Associations (Fenegosida) and Federation of Nepal Gold

Silver Gem and Jewellery Association—met with CPN-UML Chairman Jhalanath Khanal on Thursday. The jewellers are reportedly seeking time of UCPN-Maoist Chairman Puspa Kamal Dahal and top leaders of other political parties.

Irate jewellers have continued a nationwide closure of jewellery shops to pile pressure on the government to  prevent action against the jewellers who were found guilty during monitoring and stop lab test of their jewellery products. Customers have been hit hard as jewellery traders across the country continued their protest, shutting their shops for the past nine days.

Govt extends bid submission deadline for third time

KATHMANDU, JUNE 20--The government has extended the deadline for submitting bid documents for the Kathmandu-Tarai Fast Track project by three more months. This is the third extension of the deadline after shortlisted Indian firms sought more time for preparatory study on the project.

Three Indian firms — Reliance Infrastructure, Infrastructure Leasing & Financial Services (IL&FS) and Larsen and Turbo (L&T) Infrastructure Development Projects — are in the race for the contract of the 76-km highway. As per the new timeline, the firms will have to submit the technical and financial proposals completing all required study within September 21. The existing deadline is expiring on June 21.

The Ministry of Physical Infrastructure and Transport said IL&FS and L&T had sought until September 30 to review traffic study. “We offered the additional time as the Indian firms sought more time citing the need to study traffic and impact after the government permitted private sector to build the Kathmandu-Hetauda Tunnel Highway,” said Tulasi Prasad Situala, secretary at the Physical Infrastructure Ministry.

Last month, the government had given its go ahead to Nepal Purbadhar Bikas Company (NPBC) to construct the 58-km tunnel highway under the build, operate, own and transfer BOOT model. Physical Infrastructure Ministry officials said the Indian firms were “bit skeptical” over the Fast Track project saying the tunnel highway reduces the traffic volume on Fast Track.

SC issues so-cause to NTA, telcos

KATHMANDU, JUN 18--The Supreme Court (SC) on Tuesday issued the show-cause order responding to the writ petition filed by STM Telecom Sanchar against the decision to issue the unified telecom licence. The SC has also decided to continue hearing of STM Telecom’s case along with other cases related to the unified licence on June 24.

A single bench of Acting Chief Justice Damodar Prasad Sharma had issued the show-cause notice to defendants in written before June 24, according to the Nepal Telecommunications Authority (NTA). Seeking stay order against the decisions to issue unified licence and assign frequency to United Telecom Limited (UTL) and Smart Telecom, STM Telecom had filed the case against the NTA, UTL and Smart Telecom last week.

Two months ago, NTA had decided to issue the unified licence to UTL and Smart Telecom and assign 5 MHz frequency to the both companies in 900 MHz band for service operation. STM Telecom had also applied for a unified license along with Smart Telecom and UTL. However, the NTA had decided to issue the licence to STM Telecom in future citing the company’s failure to meet government-set criteria in the Nepal Gazette.

Govt-jewellers talks end inconclusive

KATHMANDU, JUN 18--The talk between the government and agitating jewellers ended inconclusively on Tuesday. During the talk, Narayan Prasad Bidari, director general of the Department of Commerce and Supply Management had asked the traders to stop their protest and return to daily business.

 Since new commerce secretary is yet to assume office, jewellers had sit for talk with the Commerce Department. “Our talk ended without reaching any conclusion, after the jewellers put their demands unreasonably and refused to stop the protest,” said Hari Narayan Belbase, director of the Department of Commerce and Supply Management. He added their demand to stop the action on jewellers found involved in cheating customers held no ground.

Jewellery shops across the country have remained closed since last Wednesday hitting hard the customers at the time of wedding season. Two organisation of the gold and silver dealers— the Federation of Nepal Gold and Silver Dealers’ Associations (Fenegosida) and the Federation of Nepal Gold, Silver, Gem and Jewellery Associations have been demanding the government not to take action on jewellers found guilty and introduce monitoring and jewellery trading directive at the earliest.

NT increases validity period of pre-paid mobile recharge

KATHMANDU, JUN 18--There is a good news for Nepal Telecom (NT)’s pre-paid mobile users who spend less in telecom service. The company has decided to increase the validity period of the balance recharge for its CDMA and GSM pre-paid mobile service effective from Wednesday.

The validity period for recharging the balance by Rs 50 has been incrased to 30 days from 7 days. Similarly, the validity for recharging the balance by Rs 1,000 has been increased to two years from one year. The validity period for recharging the balance by Rs 100, Rs 200 and Rs 500 has been increased to 60 days, 140 days and 360 days respectively.

Customers and the Nepal Telecommunications Authority (NTA) had for a long time been pressuring the NT to increase the validity period saying that the existing time limit was too short. The company in its press release state that the new provision will allow low-spending customers to get service for a longer time.

The new validity period will be applicable to balance recharges done through scratch cards and mobile point of sales (MPoS) which is also known as pin-less top-up. The MPoS system allows NT pre-paid mobile users to recharge their balance through authorised retailers of NT.

Road Dept seeks Rs 4b for bridge works

KATHMANDU, JUN 18 -The Department of Roads has demanded the government allocate at least Rs 4 billion for bridge works in the budget for the next fiscal year. The fund sought includes expenses for construction of new bridges, improvement and maintenance of old ones on local, feeder road s and highways.

“We will be requiring a total of around Rs 5 billion, of which Rs 1 billion will be supported by the World Bank under the Bridges Improvement and Maintenance Programme (BIMP),” said Umesh Jha, manager of the department’s Bridge Project.

He said the department has also requested the Finance Ministry to increase the budget ceiling for bridge works in the next fiscal year.

This fiscal year, the government had provided Rs 3.75 billion for the project. The department said it requires more budget for bridges in the Strategic Road Network (SRN) as the government has to provide counterpart fund for the BIMP which is focused on SRN bridges.

Bhattarai-led govt ‘violated rules’ to allocate funds to road projects

KATHMANDU, JUN 17 -The Baburam Bhattarai-led government distributed around Rs 1.75 billion to regional road projects (district road s) in violation of the rules, it has been revealed.

Sources at the Department of Roads said the resources were allocated to over 200 road projects “under political pressure” right before the formation of the current government.

As per the existing budget ceiling for regional road s, the road department can provide up to Rs 900,000 per year per project. But, the road department provided Rs 42 million to Dumra-Maharajgunj-Hardauna road project in Kapilvastu; Rs 20 million to Charikot-Kalinchowk Road; and Rs 17.5 million to Rabi-Madhumalla-Urlabari Road in Jhapa. These are only some examples.

Road department officials have suspected the resources given to the projects exceeding the ceiling could have been misused. According to the sources, the department allocates Rs 700,000 to district road s connecting business hubs within a district, and Rs 900,000 to road s that link two districts.

Flyover plan fails to take off

KATHMANDU, JUN 16 -The government’s much-talked-about plan to build a ramped flyover at the New Baneshwor junction to ease traffic movement has failed to take off this fiscal year too. Work to this effect hit rough weather after indecision on design and length.

As per the original plan, the government was supposed to call a tender and start construction of the 90-m long (excluding ramp) and 17-m wide four-lane flyover from Bijuli Bazaar to Tinkune in last fiscal year. A fund of Rs 50 million was provided to the Department of Roads, the implementing agency, this year to begin the work.

“We could not work on the flyover plan as there was no final decision regarding the design and length,” said a high-level official at the department. The official said the Ministry of Physical Infrastructure and Transport changed the original idea and asked to go for a 30-m long flyover or a four-lane road at the lower level than the existing west-east road from Everest Hotel to International Convention Centre.

The idea of the lower-level road and shorter flyover is to save investment, according to the Physical Infrastructure Ministry. The originally proposed 90-m long flyover was estimated to cost around Rs 600 million. However, the new idea failed to convince some top road department officials, and the consultant also said plan “is not good in terms of road safety”.

STM drags NTA to court for not issuing unified licence

KATHMANDU, JUN 13 -Complaining about the regulator’s “biased treatment”, STM Telecom filed a case in the Supreme Court on Wednesday. STM is one of the three companies that had applied for a unified license to Nepal Telecommunications Authority (NTA) along with Smart Telecom and United Telecom Limited (UTL), but was not granted the licence.

The NTA had refused to issue the licence to STM, citing its failure to meet government-set criteria. The regulator, however, had decided to award the licence to rest of the two operators.

“We had no other option but to move the court after the NTA failed to treat us equally,” said Ashish Sharma, general manager of Chaudhary Group, which owns 80 percent in STM Telecom. He added STM had completed expanding telecom services in the Eastern Development Region as per the condition in the existing licence.

While deciding to grant the licence to UTL and Smart Telecom two months ago, NTA had asked STM to first fulfil the requirements as provisioned in the Nepal Gazette.

Gold traders launch protest ‘to save cheats’

KATHMANDU, JUN 12 - Gold and Silver traders on Wednesday launched an ‘indefinite shutdown’ of their shops to pressure the government not to take action against three bullion traders who were found cheating consumers in weight and quality.

The government is preparing to file a court case against Shree Ganapati Jewellers, Tejmin Jewellers and RB Diamonds which were found involved in the misconduct during a joint inspection carried out by the Department of Commerce and Supplies Management and Nepal Bureau of Standards and Metrology (NBSM). The department has filed a charge sheet at the office of the public prosecutor.

The government has made it clear that those found guilty would be brought to book at any cost. “They are shutting down their shops to save those who are cheating consumers and those found guilty during the government’s inspection,” said Lal Mani Joshi, secretary at the Ministry of Commerce and Supply. “But the government will not shy away from taking legal action against the guilty.”

Joshi said the District Administration Office district concerned could initiate action if the traders continue their strike. However, two gold traders’ organisations — Federation of Nepal Gold and Silver Dealers’ Association (Fenegosida) and Federation of Nepal Gold Silver Gem and Jewellery Associations — have joined forces to save those found cheating consumers.

Taxi fares to go up to Rs 37 per km

KATHMANDU, JUN 12 -Taxi passengers will have to open their wallets wider as the government has planned to hike fares to keep pace with rising costs. The Department of Transport Management has proposed to the Ministry of Physical Infrastructure and Transport to increase the taxi fare by Rs 5 per km to Rs 37 per km. The new fare represents a 15.62 percent rise.

The Physical Infrastructure Ministry is likely to okay the new tariff in the next two weeks. The department stated that it had to increase the fare as it has not been revised in almost five years. The proposed hike is based on components including the consumer price index, growing maintenance expenses and staff salary, it added.

“We asked the government to increase the taxi fare last week,” said Sarad Adhikari, technical director of the Transport Department. He added that taxi operators had long been demanding that the fare be increased, but it had not been able to do so because it wanted to carry out a study first.

Vehicle registration projected to break record this year

KATHMANDU, JUN 12 -The first 10 months of the current fiscal year has seen a significant growth in registration of new vehicle s. The number of vehicle s registered over the period has surpassed the figure achieved in the entire last fiscal year 2011-12.

Import/sales trend indicates annual vehicle registration this year could break previous records. Annual vehicle registration had hit record high of 201,787 units in 2009-10. In the review period, 174,485 units of new vehicle s entered the market—17,448 units per month on an average. In the whole last fiscal year, 170,084 automobiles were registered, according to the Department of Transport Management.

The department said easy bank financing facility at cheaper interest rates contributed to the increased vehicle imports.

In the two wheeler segment, a total of 147,783 units of motorbikes were registered in the review period. The figure was at 145,135 units in the last fiscal year. The department said, around 90 percent of the vehicle s being registered annually are two-wheelers.

Life after SLC

This year, out of total 547,165 students appearing in the SLC exam, 41.57 percent has passed the examination, known as the 'Iron Gate' among the students. Congratulation to fresh SLC graduates and Best of Luck to those who failed to enter through the gate for exempted SLC exam.

Obviously, now the students will start thronging in colleges to get information about higher studies. Basically, it is important to decide on the subject to be pursued for your studies and future career visiting any college inquiry. Most students who pass SLC are confused about their future academic course. This is happening mainly because of friends' influence and parent pressure.

Students can take advice from friends and family, however they must make the final decision themselves based on interest, capability and future scope competitive domestic and international labour market. Academicians opined that the students should examine the educational background of the past 10 years and opt for a course in +2 based on their performance in class 10. There will be no use opting for science if student is weak in math.

NTA fails to take decision on its annual programme

KATHMANDU, JUN 10 -The Nepal Telecommunica-tions Authority (NTA) has failed to take any decision on its annual programme for the next fiscal year as its board meeting has not taken place for nearly two months.

After its decision to grant unified license to Smart Telecom was challenged in the Supreme Court, the NTA board has remained passive on taking any further decision. Another court case against the appointment of its chairman Digambar Jha is also pending in the court after an interim order against the appointment.

The Ministry of Information of Communications has authorised the NTA board to take decisions in the absence of a chairman by activating clause 60 of the Telecommunications Act that gives the power to remove difficulties and hurdles in the implementation of the Act.

“As the board meeting has not been held, we have been unable to present and get our annual programme approved,” said NTA Director Purushottam Khanal.

Two firms issued LoI for study on shortening Mid-Hill Highway

KATHMANDU, JUN 09 -The government has issued the letter of intention (LoI) to two consultants for conducting a feasibility study on reducing the length of the Mid-Hill Highway.

The Department of Roads has said it will soon sign a contract with the consultants and come up with a new alignment plan for the national priority project within a year.

The two firms are Integrated Developments and Research Services (IDRS) and Beam Consultant. They will carry out the study in two packages. Under the package one, IDRS has proposed to conduct the study of the East section from Pokhara at Rs 1.76 million, excluding VAT. And, Beam has proposed to study the section West from Pokhara at Rs 7.27 million, according to the department.

The current length of the highway is 1,776 km, and many of its sections are overlapped with existing roads. The government, for the last two years, has been planning to cut the length of the highway by at least 300 km, adopting new alignments and tunnels wherever possible.

Handset shortage hits NT’s IP-CDMA project

KATHMANDU, JUN 04 -Nepal Telecom’s (NT) plan to distribute new mobile lines under its new IP-CDMA project has hit snag due to the shortage of handsets compatible with the technology. Even as the company targets to sell 300,000 Removable User Identity Module (RUIM) cards by the end of the current fiscal year, it has not been able to intensify its distribution plan.

NT’s RUIM cards require separate handsets that support voice and data service in IP-CDMA network.
The state-owned company had signed agreement with authorised dealers of Samsung and Alcatel to supply handsets and sell bundling with RUIM cards. But Samsung’s IP-CDMA handset is not compatible with NT’s RUIM card and Alcatel’s bidding handset has become obsolete.

NT so far has distributed around 145,000 RUIM cards—a majority of which includes distribution to existing customers who replaced their old CDMA mobile RUIM cards, according to Rajesh Joshi, joint spokesperson for NT.Old CDMA lines used to support either voice or data service only. Joshi said the new RUIM card has the capacity to provide voice and high speed data service too.