Nepali petrol dealers start to strike

Nepal Petroleum Dealer's Association has presented a 7-point demand before the government and decided to shut down petrol-pumps throughout the country starting from Tuesday.

According to the National News Agency RSS, the association also called on for the immediate resignation of the minister for Industry, Commerce and Supplies, dismissal of the deputy director general of the Nepal Oil Corporation (NOC) and compensate different petrol-pumps vandalized in course of demonstrations on Saturday and Sunday.

Similarly, the association also put up demands before the NOC to issue white papers by maintaining transparency regarding expenditures on procurement, storage, transportation and other details of the petroleum products and revoke the quota system introduced by the NOC to make the supply smooth and accessible and ensure security to the petrol pumps.

President of the Association Shiv Prasad Ghimire said here Tuesday that within the two days of demonstration against increase in the petroleum products, a total of 14 petrol pumps, including nine in the capital Kathmandu Valley and five outside the capital city had been vandalized, causing damage worth some 5 million Nepali rupees (71,428 US dollars).

He reiterated the firm stand regarding not to open petrol pumps till their demands were addressed.

The association confirmed that it has stopped buying petroleum products from the NOC from Monday evening.

Earlier Monday, the Nepali capital Kathmandu Valley saw an erratic supply of petroleum products. None of the private petrol pumps sold petrol products, hence some security force-owned petrol pumps saw serpentine queues throughout the day.

Bowing down to mounting pressure from the general public, the government on Sunday nullified its Friday's petrol price hike decision.

Source: Xinhua