August 9: Five different unions of employees affiliated to the Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal (CAAN) have made public their protest programmes against the two bills that propose splitting the CAAN into an air service provider and a regulatory body. As soon as the bill was passed by the National Assembly last Monday, the employees' union made public the protest programme to revoke the decision.

These bills have not been passed by the House of Representatives yet. The employees have voiced their opposition against the 'Nepal Aviation Authority Bill -2076' and 'Nepal Civil Aviation Authority Bill-2076' before the lower house takes a final decision to approve them. In a press statement issued on Sunday, the unions said that the bills were against the national interest as a whole and could raise serious questions about aviation security.

They say that the bill has been brought in an unplanned manner to make the air service more expensive by handing over the Tribhuvan International Airport to the private sector. The press statement accused the government to weaken the CAAN in the name of transforming it.

The agitation programme will include pen down every day from 10 am to 1 pm and picketing the office of the Director-General of CAAN from 12 noon to 1 pm.

Similarly, the press statement further mentions that the protest would be intensified if their demands are not addressed and the bills withdrawn.

The statement has the signatures of Min Prasad Khanal of CAAN's Employees Union, Ajit Kumar Gupta of Madhesh Terai Employees Union, Laxman Kumar Giri of Democratic Employees Union, Nanda Prasad Timilsina of National Employees Union, and Shravan Kumar Yadav of Nepal National Employees Union. The bill was registered by the then Tourism Minister Yogesh Bhattarai in the National Assembly on March 26, 2019.