No improvement in sand, aggregate supply

KATHMANDU, Aug 31:

Supply of sand and aggregate has not improved even though it has already been a week since a meeting held in the presence of Chief Secretary Leela Mani Poudyal served a deadline to all line agencies, including chief district officers of all 75 districts, to make supplies of the key construction materials normal within three days.

The meeting of monitoring committee on sands and aggregate held on August 24 had taken a nine-point decision including collection of sand and aggregate stock in all districts within three days.

However, only 17 districts have submitted their reports to the Ministry of Federal Affairs and Local Development (MoFALD) so far. The reports, however, aren´t much workable. There is no separate data of processed and unprocessed sands and aggregate.

The committee had also decided to take action against those selling construction materials at inflated rates by creating artificial shortage. But no such action has been taken so far even though black-marketeering of sand and aggregate is rampant in market.

Crusher entrepreneurs as well as tippers and trucks operators are putting pressure on government to remove ban on mining of sand and aggregate. They blocked traffic in Tinkune on Friday to protest the decision.

When Republica asked Chief Secretary Poudyal why not a single decision taken on August 24 was implemented, he said he was unaware of the issue as he attended the meeting only as per the request of the monitoring committee. “I don´t know where the problem is - above me or below me,” wondered Poudyal.

Chief Secretary also chairs central monitoring committee which is also responsible for controlling black-marketing and artificial shortage of any commodities in the market.

The monitoring committee on sands and aggregate is headed by MoFALD Secretary Som Lal Subedi. He was not available for comment despite Republica´s repeated attempts.

Talking to Republica on Thursday, Subedi had referred the issue to the home ministry saying that he does not look after market monitoring issues.

Jyoti Baniya, general secretary of Forum for Protection of Consumer Rights, said Finance Minister Ram Sharan Mahat had intervened into the issue. He also said Mahat was trying to foil efforts to standardize crusher operators.

Speaking at a program on Tuesday, Mahat had said that the government will lift ban on only those crusher industries that comply with the government norms.

Likewise, the monitoring committee had also directed the Ministry of Industry (MoI) to make public the names of crusher operators that meet the standards set by the government in national daily newspapers within three days. But MoI is yet to collect names of such operators.

Crusher operators have been pressing the government to relax its standards which was implemented from the very first day of the current fiscal year. They have been barring crusher operators, who have complied with the new standards, from mining.

Majority of crusher operators have failed to abide by the new standards that require them to keep their plant at a certain distance from rivers, forests, highways and human settlements. They have also failed to keep record of new mining from quarries.

Kiran Panthi from Sanepa, Lalitpur had registered a complaint at Hello Sarkar -- a central agency to address public complaints -- on August 24, requesting the government to control black-marketing of construction materials. She had reported that traders in Naikap and Kalanki were demanding as much as Rs 25,000 for a tipper-load of aggregate.

Source: Republica