BHAKTAPUR: Janak Education Material Centre (JEMC), authorised government body for the publication and distribution of textbooks for government schools, has hiked school textbook prices.

Organising a press conference today, the centre informed about the price hike of the textbooks from grade one to eight citing price rise in printing materials and non-adjustment of price since 2001.

Ramchandra Silwal, acting managing director, JEMC, informed that per page of the textbooks for grade one to three costs 27 paisa while for four to eight grades, the per page cost is 30 paisa. Earlier, it used to cost 22 paisa for grade one to three textbooks and 26 paisa for four to eight grade textbooks.

Informing that the centre had upped the price of the textbooks in consensus with the government, he said, "Since 2001, the centre has not reviewed and raised the price. Meanwhile, the price of paper, ink and other materials has gone up. So, the centre is compelled to hike the price. After the price hike, the centre can compensate the loss."

Manohar Lamichhane, deputy director, JEMC, said after the hike, price of per set of textbooks of grade one, two and thee are fixed at Rs133. 25, Rs 128. 75, and Rs 158 respectively. Similarly, per set of textbooks of grade four and five now costs Rs 205. 25 and Rs 222. 25 respectively.

Similarly, per set of textbooks of grade six, seven and eight is priced at Rs 374, Rs 383. 25 and Rs 377. 50 respectively.

Prior to the price hike, per set of textbooks of grade one, two and three used to cost Rs 111, Rs 107 and Rs 131 respectively. Likewise, per set of textbooks of grade four and five was priced at Rs 178 and Rs164.

Each set of textbooks of grade six, seven and eight were sold at Rs 322.50, Rs 331.80 and Rs 326.70.

Ramchandra Silwal, acting managing director, said that price hike will not have extra burden on students as the government is bearing the total expense and the centre is distributing the textbooks from one to eight for free. He also clarified that price in the textbooks of grade 9 and 10 were not hiked as the students have to purchase them on their own.