With experience flying to 34 international destinations, Nepal Airlines Corporation was once a pride of Asia. The corporation had a monopoly on domestic and international flights.

The corporation's Boeing aircraft flew the national flag from Osaka, Japan in East Asia to Frankfurt, Germany and London in the West. However, in the years after the restoration of democracy, political interference repeatedly led the corporation to a cycle of controversy and losses. In 2078 BS, to protect the reputation of the organization and improve its financial situation, the government led by the then Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba entrusted the responsibility of the executive chairman of the corporation to Yubaraj Adhikari of Ilam for four years. However, Adhikari, who was embroiled in various controversies rather than reforming the corporation, has left after completing his term on Friday.

Before becoming the executive chairman in 2078 BS, Adhikari had served the corporation for 34 years from officer to director and retired due to the age limit of 58. He had been living at home for one and a half years since his retirement. It was the time after the lockdown and COVID. Since the resignation of the corporation's chairman and former secretary Sushil Ghimire, the management led by the corporation's general manager Dim Prasad Poudel was responsible for the 'institutional reform' of the corporation.

At that time, former Prime Minister Jhalanath Khanal gave a political appointment to an officer from his own district on the condition of a monthly salary of Rs 100,000. As per Adhikari's demand, some trade union leaders humiliated General Manager Dim Prasad Poudel, who was playing a positive role in the reforms of the corporation, and blocked him from entering the corporation. The then Tourism Minister Prem Ale removed some board members including Poudel and appointed Adhikari as the chairman and general manager. The members of the board of directors were also changed as per his advice.

Nepal's tourism sector had high expectations after Adhikari, who had spent his career in the corporation, came to the executive role. With his arrival, there were expectations of reforms within the corporation. The Citizens Investment Fund, which invested Rs 24 billion in loans for the corporation's aircraft alone, the Employees Provident Fund, the Ministry of Finance, which invested Rs 6 billion in Chinese aircraft, and banks and financial institutions, which invested crores in short-term loans, also expected the corporation to take off again under the leadership of experienced employees of the corporation's financial department.

Adhikari was ready to face challenges such as reviving the tourism sector, which had stagnated after the lockdown. At that time, the corporation had a long-term debt of 47 billion rupees. He also promised to reduce the debt. He was ready to pay the installments as per the agreement. In order to ‘spread the wings’ of the corporation, he had also made a commitment to the employees to expand flights to new international destinations including South Korea and Australia at the welcoming ceremony organized at the corporation. He had also promised to return the Chinese aircraft grounded by his previous management to domestic flights.

However, Adhikari has now left after completing his term without being able to improve the problems seen in the corporation. Adhikari’s term ended during the Tihar holiday. He has been on compulsory leave since Friday. What the government and the corporation had expected, Adhikari could not fulfill that expectation in four years. Adhikari’s second inning, who joined the corporation after catching a political turn, was also lost in a cloud of controversy. ‘Half of the four years of his term were spent in litigation and writing explanations, responding to complaints,’ Adhikari told Kantipur.

Adhikari had good opportunities when he came to the corporation. The corporation’s fleet of Boeings had already been withdrawn from flights. There was no problem of frequent aircraft breakdowns and cancellations of flights. At that time, new international airports were operational in Pokhara and Bhairahawa along with Tribhuvan International Airport. A strong infrastructure had been established to fly planes anywhere in the Asian region from three international airports.

However, he first had to face the taluk minister who appointed him. In Asad 2079, the then Tourism Minister Ale assaulted him. An audio conversation in which Ale abused Adhikari obscenely was made public by the media. After that audio was made public, Ale confiscated his phone.

‘Ale had pressured the corporation to lease land on New Road to Deepak Malhotra, a businessman,’ Adhikari said while discussing the dispute. ‘When I did not accept that proposal, I was abused. There were also issues of ground handling and not hiring the pilot son of a joint secretary of the Ministry of Forests. When he did not accept it, Ale assaulted him.’ Ale later formed an investigation committee and dismissed him twice after asking for an explanation. After his dismissal, the Council of Ministers appointed Dipuraj Jwarchan, a pilot of the corporation, as the general manager. Adhikari approached the Supreme Court with a writ petition against the decision of the Council of Ministers and his dismissal.

A joint bench of Supreme Court Justices Anand Mohan Bhattarai and Nahakul Subedi on 25 Asho 2079 said that the ‘suspension process was flawed’ and returned him to the Corporation. The appointment of Zwarchan was not recognized. This was an interim order. Adhikari’s case was then brought up for hearing many times. But it was not debated. After Ale, 5 ministers changed in the Ministry of Tourism, but Adhikari’s case never came up.

His relationship with the ministers after Ale also did not improve. But the same interim order saved his job. However, he could not escape the explanation. Finally, Adhikari has returned home now after completing his term. While he was in the Corporation, he never held a public program. He stopped the Corporation’s anniversary program citing financial burden. He never informed about the Corporation’s situation in a press conference.

Not only this, his relationship with the regulatory body, the Civil Aviation Authority of Nepal, did not improve during his time in the Corporation. NEA Director General Pradeep Adhikari asked him for an explanation on the charge of taking Minister Sudan Kirati to the aircraft parking lot without wearing a ramp jacket. He was denied an airport entry pass. In recent months, the NEA had also reduced the authority of the officer to the position of accountable manager.

The relationship between him and the employees who assisted in the appointment continued to be cold not only with the ministry, the minister, and the NEA, but also with the corporation. He had to keep a bodyguard from a private security company until the end, thinking that he could be attacked from within or from outside. Along the way, he demoted a driver who was also a trade union leader working at the airport, and reduced the transfer and performance evaluation of many employees who were uncooperative. Adhikari said that he had also registered a case with the Cyber ​​Bureau against that driver.

Adhikari had been involved in various controversies before. When he was the head of the corporation's financial department in 2074 BS, two female officers working there had filed a complaint of sexual harassment against him. After which the then general manager Sugatratna Kansakar brokered a settlement. The employees of that agreement recorded the video in a secret meeting room inside Sugat Ratna's office and made it public. After Adhikari became the chairman, he gave information to the Authority that would help in the widebody case to take revenge on Sugat Ratna.

According to the employees of the Corporation who were acquitted in this case, the reply to the email he wrote to Airbus about how much it would cost to fly a widebody from Bhairahawa at 242 tons became the basis of strong evidence for the Authority and the special court in the case. In the email, Airbus wrote that if the structure of the maximum takeoff weight (MTOW) of both the Corporation's widebodies was changed, a fee of 3.3 million (Rs. 460 million) would be charged per widebody. The Corporation is currently flying from Kathmandu with the maximum load capacity of both the widebodies set at 232 tons. Adhikari is also involved in the widebody procurement process. However, he said that he had a different opinion on the load capacity and did not sign the tender documents.

After joining the corporation, Adhikari insisted that the interest rate on the loans of the Employees Provident Fund and Citizens Investment Fund should be reduced by around 10 percent. According to the corporation's finance department, when he joined the corporation, there was a debt of 47 billion. When he left, it had increased to around 52 billion. The corporation's accumulated deficit was 4 billion, which has reached 17.5 billion rupees. 'The interest on the debt became excessive due to the corporation's inability to improve its financial condition,' Adhikari told Kantipur, 'Even the government did not help.'

After Covid, the corporation's income was decreasing and expenses were increasing. This figure did not improve after Adhikari came. According to the corporation's finance department, in the year 2077/78, the corporation earned an income of 9.46 billion. That year, the corporation's loss was 4.85 billion rupees. The next year, the income increased to 17 billion. But the corporation suffered a loss of 1.91 billion rupees.

In the fiscal year 2079/80, the corporation had a turnover of 24.21 billion rupees but incurred a loss of 660 million rupees. In the fiscal year 2080/81, the corporation had a turnover of Rs 20.5 billion. But there is a loss of Rs 1.5 billion. In the last fiscal year, the corporation had a turnover of Rs 21 billion. The overall accounts for this year have not been released. But officials from the corporation's finance department have projected a loss of more than Rs 1 billion.

According to Jitendra Dhital, administrator of the Employees Provident Fund, the corporation had taken a loan of Rs 22 billion from the fund to purchase a wide-body and a narrow-body. The corporation will have to repay Rs 32.34 billion in principal and interest on this investment by the fund by Asoj. Similarly, the Citizens Investment Fund has also invested Rs 12 billion in a wide-body aircraft. According to the fund, the corporation has already incurred a loan liability of Rs 21.12 billion in principal and interest. Both these bodies have said that Adhikari, while he was the executive chairman, delayed regular installments and interest payments and did not follow the agreement. However, Adhikari stated that during his 4-year tenure, he paid installments of Rs 8.45 billion including interest to both organizations.

Adhikari had the engine of a narrow-body aircraft repaired in Israel last year. The Corporation's engine was repaired and ready 6 months ago. Meanwhile, a rented engine is installed on the aircraft. This is a dispute of about 2 billion rupees. Adhikari could not bring his engine to Nepal on time as per the agreement. The Corporation is currently conducting an internal investigation into this matter. The matter became controversial when he demanded compensation until the end due to the Israeli company's delay in repairs.

Adhikari could not auction the Chinese aircraft costing 6 billion, the old Boeing aircraft and its spare parts, and goods worth about 1 billion rupees. The Corporation has a charter fee of 130 million rupees remaining from the government. He could not pay attention to this government arrears either. Instead, the Corporation's employees have filed a complaint with the CIAA against him on more than 25 charges, including hiring unnecessary employees while leaving, and extorting money from employees.

Adhikari remained in the news during his four-year tenure due to more controversies than flights. The expectations that the then government had made Adhikari the executive chairman did not materialize. Finally, he expanded the corporation's flights to the commercial city of Guangzhou in China. That too, due to the corporation's own weaknesses, the first flight could not take place on the scheduled day.

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'Half of the tenure was spent writing explanations'

How do you review your four-year tenure?

Half of the four years were spent writing responses and explanations to complaints. Work could not be done as expected.

What are the achievements of your tenure?

I am the only executive chairman who spent the entire tenure in the corporation. During this period, I expanded flights to Dammam in Saudi Arabia and Guangzhou in China. Soon, flights will also be made to Australia and Korea. All the work is almost complete.

What hindered you in the corporation?

The biggest obstacle is the interest rate taken on loans for the purchase of narrow-body and wide-body aircraft. 10 percent interest is too much. The interest that is nowhere else has become the main obstacle to our economic progress. The second is the lack of aircraft.

When you were leaving, complaints were filed against you, why?

All those are false allegations. I have not done anything against the law. I have done all the work by completing the process. I did it according to the advice of the department heads.

During your tenure, there was not much good news about the corporation, why is that?

I did not know how to handle the mass media. Now, whoever comes to the corporation, the first thing he should do is decide whether the news that comes to the media is right or wrong. It should be managed in a timely manner.