RAIN BRINGS RELIEF

RAIN BRINGS RELIEF
Kathmandu, 2 May: Two days of continuous pre-monsoon showers have brought some relief to people, including residents of the capital.
Crippling 14-hour daily load-shedding has been curbed unannounced with the rains.
The capital recorded 8.2mm rainfall in the last 24 hours.
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MJFN POLITICAL COMMITTEE MEETS TO SELECT MINISTERIAL TEAM

Kathmandu, 2 May: A meeting of the Upendra’s Yadav’s MJFN political committee is being held to held Monday to select a four-member government team.
The party has been allotted four ministries in the cabinet of Prime Minister Jhalanath Khanal.
Yadav will be deputy prime minister and foreign minister.
Joint Chairman Jayaprakash Prasad Gupta has opposed the delayed decision to join government and is on a nation-wide tour opposing what he calls Yadav ’s personal decision to join a shaky communist government.
‘It will be bad for the government to join an already failed government,” Gupta said.
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Rs. 3b CREDIT SOUGHT FROM INDIA FOR OIL IMPORT

Kathmandu, 2 May: As petroleum shortage deepens in the country due to the lack of cash to finance oil imports, the government has requested India to issue a three-month credit supply guarantee worth 3 billion rupees to the Indian Oil Corporation, the sole oil supplier to Nepal, Republica reports.

An official at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs told Republica that the government sent the request to the Indian government last week through the Indian embassy in Kathmandu and Nepali embassy in New Delhi. The Indian government has yet to respond, the official said.

Since the loss-ridden Nepal Oil Corporation (NOC) has no cash to pay for oil imports, the government is left with no alternative other than to request the Indian government for a guarantee, said the official. As per the latest price quoted by the IOC, the monthly loss of NOC has jumped to Rs 2.7 billion ($38.5 million) from last month´s Rs 1.96 billion ($28 million). The accumulated loss of the troubled NOC has jumped to over Rs 15 billion ($215 million) -- almost four times its current assets.

Continued reluctance of the political leadership to adjust domestic oil prices with the international price has been one of the main reasons behind the ballooning NOC losses. The international oil price has lately touched $124 per barrel whereas it was hovering around $82 six months ago.

Mukunda Dhungel, NOC spokesperson, said the state-owned fuel importer is suffering a whopping loss of Rs 8.01 and Rs 23.42 per liter in petrol and diesel respectively.

Similarly, the loss per liter of kerosene has gone up to Rs 13.61 and per cylinder of cooking gas Rs 322.06. However, NOC is still enjoying a profit of Rs 7.06 per liter in aviation fuel.

Apart from the request for credit supply guarantee, the government has also initiated process to arrange Rs 2 billion in loan for cash-strapped NOC through the Employees´ Provident Fund (EPF). However, given the present scale of losses, the loan amount even if approved will barely cover NOC´s losses of one month.

Meanwhile, IOC has increased fuel supply to Nepal after being informed about the government´s fresh move to arrange loan to NOC. The protracted scarcity has hit consumers across the country for the last 19 days. In second week of April, the government had issued Rs 1.50 billion in loan to NOC.
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SC SAYS LAWYERS SLOWING DOWN GRAFT CASES
Kathmandu, 2 May: Defence lawyers are strategically using their right to postpone hearings to stall verdict on corruption cases, said a study commissioned by the Supreme Court, The Himalayan Times reports.

A panel, led by Justice Prakash Osti also blamed judges and government attorneys for not expediting hearings. There was an instance when hearing was postponed more than 20 times after defence lawyers, government attorneys and even judges called it off, said Shreekanta Paudel, SC spokesperson. Hearings were also put off due to technical reasons, added Paudel,

Although a lawyer is allowed to call for hearing postponement only twice, different lawyers involved in the case use their right at different times and the hearings are postponed time and again.

The panel was formed by Chief Justice Ram Prasad Shrestha at a time when around 130 high profile graft cases involving former ministers Khum Bahadur Khadka, Govinda Raj Joshi, JP Gupta, former IGPs and former secretaries had remained pending for long. Only former minister Chiranjivi Wagle has been found guilty and sent to jail.

”Defence lawyers demand postponement of hearings to choose their judges, especially in high profile corruption cases,” said another panel member.

The panel will be recommend to the Supreme Court certain rules against undue postponement of hearings. “We are in the final stages of our study,”said Justice Osti. According to him, the panel will submit its report to the CJ before he retires on May 5.

Nepal Bar Association President Prem Bahadur Khadka, General Secretary Bijaya Prasad Mishra and leaders of Supreme Court Bar Association Krishna Prasad Sapkota and Megha Raj Pokhrel said lawyers would welcome any move of the SC to address the problem. Attorney General Yuba Raj Sangroula had called on the apex court to formulate a calendar for hearings on corruption cases to expedite verdicts.
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