Kathmandu, March 10:

Consumer Protection Forum (CPF) has said that the new fare rates fixed by the government are not scientific.

“The government has played dirty as the new fares are not scientific,” said Jyoti Baniya, CPF general secretary. The Ministry of Labour and Transport Management (MoLTM) claims to have reduced fares but fares comes to the same after a distance of six to seven km, said Baniya adding, “The ministry has only reduced the limit of minimum distance.

A traveller has to pay Rs 11 for a 6-km distance which was the same rate that people are paying till date.

According to him, the weight of fuel in determining fares is also not true. “The last two studies do not support the government’s logic,” he said.

CPF conducted study had showed that the weightage of fuel in has 12 to 18 per cent. “A study conducted by CPF in 2003 gave 12 to 18 per cent weight to fuel in logistics while another similar study commissioned by MoLTM has given 15 per cent weight to fuel,” he said adding that the second study was conducted by the Institute of Engineering (IoE) of Tribhuvan University (TU) after a directive of Supreme Court in November 2005 in a public petition filed by CPF.

The consumers have felt cheated after the ministry and transport entrepreneurs’ association published their own rates claiming to be ‘scientific’. But the public is charged with the fare fixed when the petroleum prices were at the high of Rs 100 and Rs 80 per litre of petrol and diesel.

However, the prices of petroleum products have gone down — for the fifth time — since the October 2008.