NOC distributes 200l free petrol to minister
KATHMANDU: Commerce and Supplies minister Lekharaj Bhatta revealed that Nepal Oil Corporation (NOC) distributes around Rs 60,000 worth petroleum products per month to the minister alone for free.
“The NOC distributes 200 litre worth fuel coupons daily to the minister for Commerce and Supplies, he said, addressing a programme oragnised by Nepal Petroleum Dealers National Association here in the Valley today.
The state oil monopoly distributes around 6,000 litres of petrol to the minister alone apart from government officials and their relatives for free.
Bhatta also revealed that the state oil monopoly also helps ministry for the maintenance of vehicles of the ministry. However, he did not clarify whether the corporation is distributing fuel to him or not. Though NOC has been distributing coupons since long, it has been denying the charge.
On the occasion, Bhatta also charged Nepal Bureau of Standard and Metrology of taking bribe from petroleum dealers. “Dealers are providing less quantity of fuel to the consumers by tampering pump metres,” he said, charging the department of taking up to Rs 300,000 from petroleum dealers for pumps’ metre tempering. In yet another interesting revelation, Bhatta claimed that most of the depot chiefs of Nepal Oil Corporation are indulged in corruption. According to him, petroleum dealers offer up to Rs 10,000 to load petroleum products from different depots of Nepal Oil Corporation (NOC).
“It is not fair to complain only,” he said, asking the dealers to come forward and reveal the name of corrupt NOC official and not to give commission to them. “I have directed managing director of the state oil monopoly to control irregularities at the depots and take action, if any of the officials are found guilty,” he said, blaming the politicians for rising corruption in the NOC.
“Corruption in the state oil monopoly is serious issue since the secretary of the Commerce and Supplies ministry and other responsible government officials including representative from finance ministry are in its board,” according to Bhatta. “It is sad that the NOC board failed to check corruption and irregularities.”
The Maoist minister also criticised the high level committee report submitted by lawmaker Bhim Acharya. “The report has failed to analysis the issues critically,” he said, adding that the report includes some good recommendations but it has also incorporated useless points. Nepal’s private sector alone cannot take the responsibility of importing petroleum products, Bhatta claimed. “It is easy to say but in fact Nepal’s private sector is not capable enough to handle petroleum product business alone.”
However, according to him, private sector can support the government in petroleum business. On the occasion, managing director at the NOC Suresh Kumar Agrawal said the corporation had borrowed Rs 1 billion from different commercial banks and its accumulative loan stands at 19.84 billion. Similarly, president of Nepal Petroleum Dealers National Association Saroj Prasad pande blamed depot for providing less quantity of oil. “The NOC depots are providing up to 500 litre per tank less petroleum products,” he blamed, adding that depot chief are cheating dealers after NOC fixed ceiling of technical loss.
Source: THT
