Due to high transportation cost, the cargo railway yard was not used

Industrialists in the industrial sector say that when importing industrial raw materials from the Indian Custom Yard (ICY) compared to the Nepal Custom Yard (NCY), the shipping fee is cheaper by 64 to 200 rupees per ton.

On May 18, Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal and Indian counterpart Narendra Modi jointly inaugurated the cargo railway from Bathnah to Biratnagar Customs ICP in India. On the day the cargo train was inaugurated, the raw material of the Aarti strips was HR Seat. Since then, the railway has not been used.

Nandkishore Rathi, senior vice president of the industry organization Morang, said that due to the huge difference in cargo handling charges and shipping rates at the railway yard towards Nepal, industrialists are using the railway yard towards India instead of using the yard towards Nepal. If the fee is equal to that of Birganj's ICD, then the railway custom yard here can be used. "Transportation and hanging charges are reasonable in ICD of Birganj."

Cargo railway has come to Nepalese land. But handling charges and shipping rates are very expensive compared to India, Rathi said. Industrialists believed that transporting industrial raw materials by cargo train would reduce the cost of transportation. But the exact opposite happened," he said. Due to the huge difference in handling charges and shipping rates, the industrialists here have been unloading industrial raw materials at the yard towards India and delivering them to the industry. According to him, by doing so, depending on the industrial raw materials, the transportation cost will be reduced from 64 to 200 rupees per ton. Chudamani Bhattarai, director general of the industry organization, says that the loading-unloading charge of the cargo and the transportation rate of up to 25 km is Rs 664 per tonne when bringing sponge iron from the railway to the Indian cost yard at ICP in Jogbani. The parking fee is fixed at Rs.32. Thus, one ton of sponge iron from the Indian custom yard to the industry costs 696 rupees.

"When the same sponge iron is brought from Nepal Custom Yard at ICP in Biratnagar, the loading-unloading charge per ton is 400 and the cost of transportation up to 25 km is 360 rupees per ton, and the cost is 760 rupees," said Bhattarai. According to the sponge iron importer, at least 2500 tons of sponge comes in one rack. Bringing it through Indian Customs (ICY) is cheaper by Rs 64 per tonne. This will reduce the transportation cost of 160 thousand rupees by importing 2500 tons of iron and bringing it from ICY.

When the main raw material of GI wire is MS wire rod from ICY, the cost of loading-unloading per ton and transportation up to 25 km is 440 rupees. Apart from this there is a parking fee of Rs 32 per tonne at ICY. In this way, 472 rupees per ton will be spent on loading-unloading, transportation and parking. When the same MS wire rod is brought from NCY, the load and unloading cost per ton is Rs. 400 and the transportation cost is Rs. 240.

Director General Bhattarai says that the industrialists did not use the Nepal Railway Custom Yard since the cost of bringing it from ICY was Rs 168 per tonne compared to NCY. He said that bringing one ton of HR seats from ICY would cost 416 rupees for transportation up to 25 km and parking charge 32 rupees for 448 rupees. But when you get this HR seat from NCY, it costs Rs 620.