September 8: The government has decided to open advance ticket bookings for Dashain from September 17. A meeting of the Department of Transport Management chaired by Director General Tokraj Pandey on Wednesday decided to open advance ticket bookings from Saturday, September 17, targeting the festive season.

Bijay Bahadur Swar, president of the Federation of Nepalese National Transport Entrepreneurs, informed that the meeting has directed transport entrepreneurs to arrange for online booking as far as possible and also to provide discounts to the passengers who book tickets online.

Similarly, the meeting has decided to effectively monitor advance ticket booking and passenger vehicles leaving and entering the valley in collaboration between the department, traffic police, consumer forum, transport entrepreneurs and laborers. The meeting has also urged all stakeholders to adopt adequate health standards keeping in mind the Covid-19 pandemic.

General Secretary of the federation Deknath Gautam informed that it has been decided to completely discourage the act of selling tickets from unauthorized counters and people who do not have an identity card.

The meeting has also decided to request the concerned bodies to repair the major roads and to facilitate the traffic operation.

In order to facilitate traffic movement, it has been decided to prohibit the operation of large vehicles, except the ones used for the transportation of essential items such as food grains, from Narayanghat to Kathmandu from October 1 to 8.

The meeting was attended by Director General Pandey, Chief of Kathmandu Valley Traffic Police Office, Deputy Inspector General of Police Meera Chaudhary, DoTM directors Radhakrishna Khatiwada and Ishwaridatta Paneru, FNNTE President Swar, Senior Vice President Saroj Sitaula and other stakeholders.