Briefs (Spotlight Weekly)

Women dance on the occasion of Teej festival in Pashupatinath temple.

AT THE INITIATIVE OF PRIVATE AND BOARDING SCHOOLS Organization of Nepal (PABSON), a huge peace rally was be held on Friday (August 29) in Kathmandu city. More than 300 different organizations and 50,000 people participated in the rally including thousands of schools students. The rally started in Tundikhel in the morning and made a round of major city thoroughfares calling for the establishment of peace and security in the country.

THE MAOIST ANNOUNCEMENT OF BREAKING DOWN ceasefire has hit the secondary capital market Nepal Stock Exchange (NEPSE) which plunged by 3.29 points on Thursday (August 28). On Wednesday the NEPSE index had declined by 1.41 points. This is the biggest plunge in a single day to hit the NEPSE index in recent months. The market capitalization value of shares at the NEPSE also declined by Rs 580 million to reach Rs 36.72 billion. Analysts have said that fear of escalation of conflict has hurt the investor sentiment.

THE DEPARTMENT OF FOOD TECHNOLOGY AND Quality Control has given clean chit to beverages like Coke, Pepsi and others. Samples of these soft drink were tested by the department for quality because tests carried out by independent institutions in India had shown high level of pesticides in the drink. According to the department, the beverages did not contain any hazardous substance.

ALTHOUGH THE DIFFERENT BRANDS OF MOBILE SETS have flooded the market in Kathmandu, the custom officials say they have obtained very low volume of revenue from their import. The data of previous fiscal year (2059/60) shows that though Rs 70 million worth of normal telephone sets entered the country, there is no data on the volume of mobile sets. Recently, officials of revenue investigation department had confiscated a large volume of mobile sets at the Tribhuwan International Airport where they were being imported under the category of computer parts. The custom tariff per set of imported mobile set is around US$ 62 whereas importers need to pay only 10 percent tariff on computer parts. Authorities suspect the mobile sets are being imported in that manner.

THE MAOISTS HAVE SET FIRE AT THE Everest Paper Mill at Mahendranagar of Dhanusha district on Sunday (August 24) night and kidnapped three of its employees. Machines worth millions of rupees have been gutted. Hundreds of Maoists forced the door open, entered and set the mill on fire. The rebels sprinkled kerosene and started the fire while powerful grenades were detonated at the big machines, workers say. Before leaving after the rampage, the rebels kidnapped chief manager Krishna Kumar Tederibal, senior production manager Devendra Garg and gate-in-charge Ramesh Chandra, who were all Indian nationals.

THE APEX COURT HAS ISSUED A SHOW CAUSE notice to the cabinet secretariat, government authorities and Commission for Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA) on why they are yet to initiate action against Surya Nath Upadhyaya, chief of CIAA as per the recommendation of the probe committee on Mahakali Irrigation Project. Upadhyaya was involved in the project. Responding to a writ petition filed demanding action against Upadhyaya, the Supreme Court has given 15 days notice to show cause.