LG gas supply worsens in valley

The cooking gas supply crisis in the Kathmandu valley is worsening day by day, as the tussle between bottling companies and Nepal Oil Corporation (NOC) as well as dealers continued on Sunday.

A group of distributors and dealers Sunday gheraoed the NOC central office and asked for a smooth supply of cooking gas or liquid petroleum gas (LPG). They also threatened to halt the sale of cooking gas, if the problem is not resolved at the earliest.

Members of the LP Gas Distributors' Association, Nepal (LPGDAN) and Nepal LP Gas Dealers Association (NLPGDA) jointly organised a protest in front of the NOC central office with the placards reading 'Ensure smooth supply of LPG' and 'End drama between NOC and bottling companies' written on them.

Chandra Krishna Shrestha, president of NLPGDA, said that they would padlock the NOC office, if the issues are not sorted out by mid-day on Monday. LPGDAN and NLPGDA have already padlocked the office of Nepal LP Gas Industry Association (NLPGIA) on Friday, saying that the bottling plants are also conspiring to encourage short supply.

The dealers and distributors had submitted a memorandum to NOC last Thursday and announced a three-day long protest programme. "If the problem prolongs and crisis deepens further, distributors and dealers will organise a rally with empty cylinders and padlock the NOC head office on Monday," he said.

The crisis over the supply of cooking gas in the Kathmandu valley worsened after the bottling companies went on strike from last Sunday saying that they would not import LPG until NOC raised the import quota from the current 7,523 metric tonnes (MT) a month to a minimum of 10,000 plus metric tonnes.

"The current quota was fixed over three years ago considering the demand at that time. But it has already gone up to 10,000 MT a month. How can we meet the market demand unless the quota is raised," said Sabarmal Agrawal, president of NLPGIA.

According to him, all the industries have not taken a single product delivery order (PDO) from NOC and most of the bottling plants out of the 21 industries have already shut down their operations.

NLPGIA has also demanded to pay compensation on transport, which according to Agrawal, the bottling plants have been paying after diesel price was hiked by over 21 per cent some 14 months back.

The normal daily supply of bottled LPG in the valley stands at 10,000 cylinders. Consumers in the valley have been reeling under the shortage of gas for over three months, particularly after the terai unrest began.