Amid the short supply of petroleum products, attributed to inability on the part of Nepal Oil Corporation (NOC) to finance adequate imports, the state-owned petroleum monopolist has not been supplying even half the normal daily volume of fuel to the market over this week.[break]
"This has already forced well around 50 percent of diesel-fuelled passenger vehicles off the roads in the Valley," said Rishikesh Ghimire, a transport entrepreneur and secretary of Nepal Transport Entrepreneurs National Federation (NTENF).
As a result, almost all bus stations in the Valley now have crowds of passengers waiting for transport, a sight quite rare in the past.
"There are fewer buses operating the Duwakot-Ratnapark route, and I waited a full 45 minutes to catch a bus at Duwakot Chowk at 9:30 A.M.," said Tara Paudel of Jhaukhel-1, Bhaktapur.
When Republica found her waiting for the bus at New Baneshwor Thursday, she said the bus crew had cautioned her to be at the station by 3 p.m. to catch a ride home because they might not operate the bus after that hour.
"It´s already 3:30 p.m. I hope I´ll catch the Duwakot bus from Ratnapark," she stated.
Jhaukhel is some 14 kilometers from New Baneshwor and Paudel has no option but to catch her bus.
Some 12 buses operate the route. "But bus crew told me they´re currently operating just three buses due to diesel shortage," she added.
Other communters that Republica talked to on Thursday and Friday spoke of similar agony and inconvenience caused by the fuel shortage.
If you think the situation in the Valley is bad, things are worse with vehicles operating between Kathmandu and other cities, said Dol Nath Khanal, general secretary of NTENF.
According to NTENF, some 350 buses used to leave daily for different destinations from New Bus Park till two weeks ago. Now only around 150 buses do so.
"Some 60 percent of buses operating long routes are already in the garage. You can imagine the trouble facing people planning to travel out of the Valley," said Khanal.
The fuel shortage has also prompted some schools to announce winter vacations a week earlier than planned. The situation at development projects and industries, currently facing ll-hour power cuts, is worse still.
NOC officials said they are trying their best to supply as much fuel as possible. "But we simply have less stock," said Mohan Bahadur Karki, chief of NOC Thankot depot.
Diesel has been in short supply since about three weeks ago, mainly after cash-strapped and heavily indebted NOC failed to secure loans from banks and financial institutions.
Amid soaring losses, estimated at Rs 1.26 billion for December alone, NOC asked the government in the first week of this month to either allow it to adjust prices or provide the money to avert looming crisis.
The government turned it down and NOC has ended up failing to import adequate volumes of both diesel and petrol.
Following the petrol scarcity, the government last week agreed to provide NOC Rs 1.5 billion in loans from the Employees Provident Fund (EPF), but the money has not been released.
"The money was not disbursed because of differences over interest rate. But the matter has now been settled. NOC will get the money soon," said Commerce and Supplies Minister Lekh Raj Bhatta Friday.
Speaking at a function, he also claimed the shortage will end in a few days. However, NOC officials say they will need three to four days to ease the supply and at least a week to restore normalcy.
"And that week starts only when we actually get hold of the money and transfer it to Indian Oil Corporation," said a senior NOC official.
Meanwhile, NOC officials say the problem may resurface next month as loans will restore the fund flow only temporarily. As the gap between import and retail prices has not narrowed, NOC says it will suffer huge losses next month also. "We will then have no option but to seek more loans," said NOC spokesperson Mukunda Dhungel.
NOC currently suffers a loss of around Rs 19 on a liter of diesel, Rs 7 on a liter of kerosene and around Rs 339 per cylinder (14.2 kgs) of LPG. Its outstanding loans total around Rs 20 billion.
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