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Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal has announced a shift in the ongoing style of the government’s annual policy and programme, and budget from the upcoming fiscal year. But he has not elaborated it well.

The PM’s remarks come at a time when the government is facing to scale up the capital expenditure. 

Addressing the nation today to unveil his government’s achievements made in the past one year, the Prime Minister admitted that traditional style of policy and programme could not bring about results and added that a new style would be embraced.

Prime Minister Dahal argued that the traditional way of budget making has failed to allocate budget to the priority projects and make true estimates on expenditure, leading to direct impact on capital expenditure. “I plan to move ahead in a new style by changing the system of policy making and budget preparation,” he added. 

Dahal also shared that the principles and priorities of the budget for the upcoming fiscal year would be made public in February and the feedback from the people’s representatives and general public would be taken on it. He stated that policy, structural and legal measures would be taken with the target to obtain a double-digit economic growth rate. 

The Prime Minister was of the view that the government is making the best possible efforts despite the journey to development and prosperity so far was not satisfactory.  The Prime Minister said that he would not make claims about the complete success of his government but announced that he would change the government's working style with this concern and self-review.

 Similarly, the Prime Minister made the announcement that he would not attend any of the public events except for some pre scheduled and compulsory ones and added that his focus would be on new policy and program, budget preparation, and resolving the issues in the areas of development and good-governance. “This will be a departure to change the government's working style. I am making changes to the structure of the Office of the Prime Minister this week,” Dahal stated.

The price of gold has increased by Rs 1, 300 per tola in the domestic market on Thursday.

According to the Federation of Nepal Gold and Silver Dealers’ Association, the precious yellow metal is being traded at Rs 122, 000 per tola today. It was traded at Rs 120, 700 per tola on Wednesday.

Meanwhile, tejabi gold is being traded at Rs 121, 400 per tola. It was traded at Rs 120, 100 per tola.

Similarly, the price of silver has increased by Rs 15 and is being traded at Rs 1,490 per tola today. 

The Public Accounts Committee of the House of Representatives has instructed the Commission for the Investigation of Abuse of Authority to conduct further investigation into the procurement process of Telecommunication Traffic Monitoring and Fraud Control System (Teramox) and proceed with the prosecution in accordance with the law.

Rishikesh Pokharel, the committee chair, also told CIAA to submit its progress reports to the committee every month. 

The committee meeting held on Wednesday concluded that no policy decision has been made regarding the study proposal for Teramox procurement and instructed Nepal Telecommunication Authority to keep the entire process on hold. The parliamentary panel also said it was yet to get the original copy of the procurement contract.  

Before issuing its decree, the committee had discussed the Teramox issue with officials of relevant agencies like NTA and Nepal Telecom.

After studying and analyzing the works done so far, the committee has come to the conclusion that the procurement process has flouted the relevant mandate of the Supreme Court, Pokharel said, summarizing the conclusion of the committee’s meeting.

Pokharel was referring to an SC order (vis-a-vis the use of a new technology) for the creation of a mechanism to make sure that the citizens’ right to privacy is not violated.

A committee member, Amresh Kumar Singh, argued that the decision to buy Teramox equipment from Lebanon was full of ill motives, whereas Rastriya Swatantra Party lawmaker Manish Jha said the purpose of the Teramox connection was not clear.

NTA had tried to purchase and use the Teramox technology to get details of illegal activities, to 

improve the quality of telecommunication services and make them more credible. 

NTA Chair Purushottam Khanal informed the committee that they have already paid 17.345 percent (Rs 520m) for Teramox procurement after opening an LC, while holding that the SC order needed upholding.

Khanal maintained that NTA’s move is in accordance with the Privacy Act, adding that they intend to use the technology to view overall call details instead of individual call details.

Prime Minister and CPN (Maoist Centre) Chair Pushpa Kamal Dahal has alleged that forces opposed to the federal democratic republic are scheming to mislead the people.

Addressing a meeting of the CPN (Maoist Centre) ward committee at Barpak Sulikot Mural municipality-8 in Gorkha under the party’s Special Transformation Campaign today, he said the enemies of the republic are conspiring to make the people dejected and mislead them against the republic.

“You and we all should prevent people being misled and dejected. These kinds of people do not even see the good works carried out by the government, do not want to show that to the people and also do not talk positively. They only talk negatively and are plotting to spread hopelessness among the people,” he said.

The PM stressed on the need of taking the people into confidence and convincing them to stop the anti-republic activities. He also explained that the main objective of conducting the special campaign is not only to make the party active and vigorous, but also to deepen its relations with the people and defend the change that has been brought after the struggle and sacrifices. The party Chair claimed that the campaign has been successful as per its mission.

PM Dahal also informed that the government has started preparations from now itself to bring the budget for the next fiscal year in a new way so that the people will get to experience the change.

“The trend of traditionally holding discussions on the topics of the budget from mid-February and concluding the same in mid-May will be put to an end now. This time the government will finalise the budget by mid-February in a new way so that the people will experience a change,” he added.

On a different note, the Prime Minister claimed that the present government and the coalition have become stronger and the present ruling alliance will last its full five-year term.

Stating that the incumbent government has liberated the usury victims from the exploitation of loan sharks, he said only the Maoist-led government can banish the corrupt, land Mafiosi and the smugglers.

He said the construction of the Budhigandaki Hydropower Project, a project of national pride, has been finalized and urged the party workers and the general public not to have doubts whether or not the project would be constructed.

The cases of COVID-19 have again emerged in the Sudurpaschim Province. The infection rate was nil until sometime ago and last week, but eight cases have been detected this week.

Ganesh Saud, an Auxiliary Health Worker stationed at the Health Desk in Gauriphanta along the Nepal-India border, said that symptoms were observed in India-returnees. Through antigen tests, eight cases have been identified lately.

Four samples of the infected have been already sent to Kathmandu through the province-based lab to find out the disease variant.

Those showing symptoms of COVID-19 at the border have been advised to observe home- isolation and those having severe symptoms are being advised to visit hospitals.

According to Saud, the World Health Organization recently warned against the detection of a new variant of the disease. 

According to the provincial Health Emergency Operation Centre, Health Directorate, three COVID-19 cases have been traced in the past three days among the people returned to Nepal from Gauriphanta and Gaddachauki checkpoints in the province.

Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal has pledged that there would be no budgetary constraint issues for the implementation of Budhigandaki Reservoir-based Project.

Speaking at a program entitled "The Prime Minister with People's Representatives and Stakeholders” organized by the Barpak Sulikot Rural Municipality in Gorkha today, he said the budget resources for Budhigandaki, the project of national pride, has been ensured. 

"Now there is no confusion over the availability of the budget for the project.  The government, through the Cabinet meeting recently, decided to allocate five percent of revenue from the physical infrastructure sector to the project."

The 1,200-megawatt project will be implemented soon, according to the Prime Minister who believes that the project implementation will pave the way for economic development, prosperity and job opportunities in Gorkha in the future.

Dahal, who is also the House of Representatives (HoR) member from the Gorkha constituency-2, said he is committed to implementing words he gave before the Gorkha folks during the election campaign period. 

Discussions are in progress to revive the Gorakhkali Rubber Industry based in Deurali of Gorkha, according to the Prime Minister.

Pressing an idea for upgrading the Aanppipal Hospital in the district to a 50-bed health facility, he pledged to initiate towards that end.

Thousands of livestock farmers across the country are awaiting compensation from the government for the loss of their cattle due to lumpy skin disease.

The lumpy skin outbreak affected 1.53m cattle across the country in the fiscal year 2023/24. Of them, 65,441 cattle died. Although the outbreak, which peaked in the June-September period, has come under control now, many farmers have lost hope of receiving any compensation from government agencies.

Even officials of the Department of Livestock Services admit that the government has failed to compensate farmers for the loss of their livestock on time. They claim that although they have forwarded details of livestock loss to the finance ministry, it has not released funds.

Lumps on skin, lesions on mucous membranes, fever, loss of appetite, reduced milk production and discharge from eyes and nose are the common symptoms of lumpy skin disease.

Experts say that although the lumpy skin outbreak has come under control with the advent of the winter season, there is a risk of another outbreak once temperatures start rising. They say the government should, therefore, prepare strategies on time to combat the outbreak.

The department has estimated the loss incurred by the farmers due to the lumpy skin outbreak at Rs 75.52bn. Experts say this is the biggest loss that livestock farmers have faced so far.

Because of the lumpy skin outbreak, farmers have witnessed a slump in the production of milk and organic fertilizers. Experts say that since farmers are facing a shortage of animals to till the land and carry loads, and they need to use their hard-earned savings to buy new animals, it can affect the gross national income. The agriculture and livestock sector contribute about 23 percent to gross domestic production. The contribution of the livestock sector is around six percent.

Lumpy skin disease (LSD) is a vector-borne viral disease affecting cattle. It causes huge economic losses to dairy farmers due to the drastic reduction in milk production. It first appeared in Bangladesh, China and India in 2019. Nepal recorded the first case of lumpy skin disease in Gandaki Province in June 2020.

The price of gold has increased by Rs 200 per tola in the domestic market on Wednesday.

According to the Federation of Nepal Gold and Silver Dealers’ Association, the precious yellow metal is being traded at Rs 120, 700 per tola today. It was traded at Rs 120, 500 per tola on Tuesday.

Meanwhile, tejabi gold is being traded at Rs 120, 100 per tola. It was traded at Rs 119, 900 per tola.

Similarly, the price of silver has dropped by Rs 10 and is being traded at Rs 1,475 per tola today.