Video Sansar

Kathmandu apr23
Gasoline lines are back in the capital after state owned Nepal Oil Corporation {NOC} started cotting deliveries.

 Petroleum dealers said fuel supplies had been reduced by 30 percent. Shortages have risen particularly in the supply of diesel said Lilendra prasad pradhan president to the Nepal petroleum Dealers Netional Association ( NPDA) .

Accrrding to him the problem is more severe in the eastern region as deliveries have been slashed by 50 percent. As the eastern region has 19 hours of load-shedding reduced supplies have hurt industrial production he said.


 However the shortage of petrol has not been that bad . On sunday NOC supplied 410 kl of petrol and 586 kl of diesel to private petrol pumps while state-owned gasoline stations got 80 kl and 78 kl respectively.

 NOC  has enforced dual pricing on diesel for bulk and industrial uses and it supplied around 35 kl of diesel on sunday. Sunday,s supplies was normal due to saturday being a public holida whe peroleum products are not consumed massively, Pradhan said. He added that the government has to address the problem before it surfaces , Meanwhile NOC said that there had been on increase in fuel imports due to inadequate cash. It had asked for Rs 2 billion from the government to make supplies smoother. However. NOC ofrom the government to make supplies smoother. However NOC officials said that the government has not responded to its proposa. . We have aske the governmet for money but it has not respouded as of now'' said NOC acting managing director Suresh Kumar Agrawal.

 On Thursday NOC said that its petroleum stocks had dropped to 14.000 kl from the normal 70,000 kl. The current stock is barely enough to meet three days demand. The government has been bailing out NOC time and again with loans and grants.

 It currently owes over Rs 23 billion. Recently it asked the government to implement an automatic fuel price adjustment mechanism and said that if it was not possible the government should be ready to spend at least Rs 18 billion on fuel subsidies in 2012 - 13.

 It has also sought Rs 10 billion for establishing a price stabilisation fund in order to reduce the impact of continuous price hikes in the international market.