KATHMANDU, May 10: With the government announcing a two-day weekend coming into effect from next Sunday, the authorities responsible to provide public utility services will have to operate their services even on a public holiday if it follows the two-day weekend.
The Ministry of Home Affairs (MoHA), in this regard, published the government decision to give holidays on Saturday and Sunday every week in the Nepal Gazette on Monday. In the new provision, government offices will run from 9:30 AM to 5:30 PM on normal days while the office time has been shortened by one hour to till 4:30 PM during winter.
Weekend fun
According to the MoHA, specific offices related to public utility will have to operate their services even on public holidays if it falls right after the two-day weekend. These include the offices related to health service, ropeway, telecommunication, police, electricity, drinking water, land revenue, banking, revenue collection, land measurement, customs and local governments, among others. However, the condition will not be applicable in case of the holidays of Dashain and Tihar.
To give respite to the employees who work on public holidays, the offices concerned should provide substitute day-off to their staff. Citing heavy drain of foreign currencies due to the soaring import of petroleum products, the government has declared a public holiday on Sunday as well to reduce fuel consumption.
