KATHMANDU, Oct 28: At a time when market monitoring programs are more concentrated in the capital, the government´s fresh report suggests that consumers outside the capital are cheated more by shopkeepers.
This was disclosed in a report released by Department of Commerce and Supply Management (DoCSM) after monitoring the market outside the Kathamndu valley during Dashain.
The DoCSM had carried out market monitoring in Chitwan and Rupandehi districts from October 20 to 23, coinciding with Dashain festival, and found most shops in the districts were flouting the existing laws.
“In the capital we used to find some shopkeepers defaulting the existing market laws. But alarmingly we found more traders in the districts were violating the laws to cheat the general consumes,” said Shankar Prasad Paudel, director of DoCSM who headed the monitoring team.
“Most of the shops which we inspected were either not registered and even if they were registered, they had not renewed their registration certificate for long. Some of them were also found using inaccurate weighing machines, selling date-expired commodities, failing to display price list and signboard,” said Poudel.
Some of them are also found to have charged higher prices to customers. Paudel said lack of frequent monitoring had created anomalies in the market outside the capital.
“We found consumers in Rupandehi were cheated more than those in Chitwan,” said Poudel.
Lack of sufficient manpower for effective monitoring was the prime cause behind black marketeering and violations of exiting market laws. He however, said higher level of awareness among customers and comparatively higher frequency of monitoring in the capital had lessened chances of cheating by shopkeepers.
DoCSM monitored groceries and medical stores in major markets of both districts.
Following the inspection, DoCSM officials had instructed most of the monitored stores to furnish clarification at respective District Administration Offices (DAOs).
The team had destroyed sub-standard products found during inspection.
In the fiscal year 2011/12, DoCSM had conducted market monitoring 860 times in the capital while the number was only 157 times outside the capital.
Out of the total 142 industries that were found guilty of cheating customers during the monitoring by DoCSM during the fiscal year 2011/12, only 5 cases were filed against the wrongdoers.
Till date most of the cases are filed inside the capital while only one or two case has been filed outside the capital.
“Most of the consumers do not file the complaint when they are cheated. If such wrong doings are brought to the notice by the consumers then such anomalies will automatically be minimized,” said Paudel.
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