Kathmandu, Sep 10 (IANS): Nepal’s Minister for Industry, Commerce and Supplies Gauri Kumari Yadav resigned on Thursday, a day after making controversial remarks targeting cooking gas bottlers amid an LPG shortage in the Kathmandu Valley.
Yadav tendered her resignation to Prime Minister Balendra Shah, her secretariat said, becoming the third minister to leave the Shah-led cabinet since he was appointed Prime Minister on March 27.
On April 9, Prime Minister Shah had dismissed then Minister for Labour, Employment and Social Security Deepak Kumar Sah on the recommendation of his party, the Rastriya Swatantra Party (RSP).
On April 22, then Home Minister Sudhan Gurung resigned over his alleged business links with controversial businessman Deepak Bhatta, who is under police custody in connection with a money laundering investigation.
However, Shah reappointed Gurung to the same post on June 9 after a government-formed committee reportedly found no evidence of improper financial dealings by him.
Yadav’s resignation came a day after she told a meeting of the Industry Committee of the House of Representatives, the lower house of Parliament, that LPG supplies would not become smooth “until the industrialists are brought to heel.”
Her remarks drew criticism from the private sector. The Federation of Nepalese Chambers of Commerce and Industry (FNCCI), the country’s apex private-sector body, on Thursday described the minister’s remarks as “highly objectionable, irresponsible and unfortunate,” saying the government should focus on resolving supply disruptions rather than blaming businesses.
The FNCCI said the movement of LPG tankers had been disrupted by landslides along the Prithvi Highway, which connects Kathmandu with various parts of Nepal, following a massive landslide in the Krishnabhir area of the highway.
The FNCCI said publicly blaming industrialists and traders could undermine their morale and weaken trust between the government and the private sector at a time when both have been working together on rescue, relief and the supply of essential goods following the natural disaster that struck the country on August 26.
On Wednesday, Yadav had complained that the cooking gas shortage persisted because private gas bottlers were refusing to cooperate with the government in addressing the shortage, particularly in the Kathmandu Valley.
It is not the first time a minister in the Shah-led cabinet has made controversial remarks about the business community.
A few months ago, Minister for Infrastructure Development Sunil Lamsal came under criticism after a video circulated on social media showed him telling officials to “break the legs” of a contractor who had failed to carry out work during an inspection of the Nagdhunga–Mugling road project along the Prithvi Highway.
During an election rally in February, Prime Minister Shah, who was then a candidate in the March 5 elections, had said that, if necessary to ensure the timely completion of road projects, contractors could be “locked in a shed, laid on the road or tied to a tree.”
