Kathmandu, February 18:

Morning classes in the Valley-based colleges are likely to be suspended soon if fuel shortage and load-shedding continue. Thanks to load-shedding and shortage of petroleum products, over 60 per cent of college students are not coming to colleges.

“We will have to suspend morning classes if the situation does not improve within two to three days,” Lok Bahadur Bhandari, managing director, Xavier International College, said.

Said Tankaraj Acharya, managing director of the Columbus Higher Secondary School and College, “We have been finding it difficult to keep science and computer laboratories running. We will have to suspend morning classes.”

The attendance of students has gone down because of fuel shortage and load-shedding. Most of the colleges open from around 6 am. College authorities say it is difficult for them to run early morning classes due to load-shedding. Lack of fuel means they cannot operate generators.

The students’ attendance in colleges has gone down by 60 per cent. “We are unable to run first two classes in the morning because of load-shedding and shortage of petrol to operate the generator,” Bhandari said.

“We are trying to run classes, but over 60 per cent of students have stopped coming to the college,” he said. Vehicular movement is so thin that it is hard for the students to get on board the vehicles.

“The number of students attending classes has been decreasing steadily,” said Surendra Shrestha, chairman of the Nobel Academy.

“This has been happening in all colleges,” Shrestha said.