‘Transport syndicate a thing of the past’

Kathmandu, July 11

Minister of Home Affairs Ram Bahadur Thapa today said that no force could revive the syndicate in transport sector.

Stating that transport syndicate had already become a matter of the past, he claimed that it was not possible to bring it back again. “There has been a conspiracy to revive the transport syndicate, which no does not exist now. The government is determined to make such attempts a failure,” he said at an interaction on ‘Present Confusion, Challenges and Solution of Transport Sector’ organised in Gongabu.

“A ploy is being orchestrated to not let thousands of businesspersons desirous of investing in the transport sector by reviving the syndicate to serve vested interests of a handful of persons, who continue to have monopoly in this sector. The government is cautious about it,” he said, adding syndicate in all sectors was a big hurdle in the process of nation-building.

Minister Thapa warned that syndicate in agriculture, education and health was also widespread and deeply rooted.

“Development and prosperity of the country is not possible until such syndicate exists,” he said. In April, the government had announced abolition of syndicate system. Police had detained as many as 93 public transport leaders, including the office-bearers of Federation of Nepalese National Transport Entrepreneurs, from different places of the country as they opposed the government’s move to break the syndicate.