Metropolis defies court stay order

Birgunj, August 16

In what can be seen as contempt of court, Birgunj metropolis has finalised the process of awarding contract for collection of road toll tax. The metropolis took a decision to award the contract to Mona Construction Pvt Ltd yesterday.

The High Court of Birgunj had on Friday issued an order to stay the entire process related to awarding the contract, in response to a writ petition.

The writ petition filed by Birgunj’s Adarsha Suppliers’ operator Pawan Kumar Kanu has the metropolis as a defendant. The tender clearly states that any company participating in the tender process must have at least two years’ of experience and must be in profit in the final audit of the previous year, but the selected company doesn’t fulfil this criteria, the writ claimed.

Meanwhile, drivers of Indian cargo vehicles today staged a demonstration at the main gate of Alau-based Integrated Check Post protesting the ‘unreasonable’ tax collected by the company responsible for the same, Mona Construction.

The complaint filed by the drivers says that the company has been collecting 190 rupees in Indian currency instead of the same amount in Nepali currency. Police also arrested three employees of the company today.

The metropolis last evening had written to Mona Construction informing the latter of its decision to award it the contract to collect annual and road toll tax for the current fiscal.