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The Pushpa Kamal Dahal-led government has completed its 100 days in office. While the government has come up with a long-list of accomplishments, experts and observers rate its performance as dismal. In this context, Kamal Dev Bhattarai  of ApEx sat down with  Bimalendra Nidhi, senior leader of Nepali Congress, a key coalition partner, to talk about the performance of the government, future of the coalition government, and its foreign policy orientation. Excerpts: How do you assess the performance of this government in its first 100 days? I have taken the government's 100-day performance in a normal and comfortable way. While talking about a government’s performance, we have to consider the popular mandate given through elections, as it determines the strength of parties represented in Parliament. This strength has a bearing on the formation of a government. At this point, government formation is an important development. This does not mean that the government has failed to perform well. Usually, experts review the performance of the government after the completion of its 100 days, but we have to accept the reality that we had to invest our time and energy to form the government itself. So, the government’s performance should be viewed from this perspective. There are already questions regarding the future of this coalition. Do you think it will sustain for a full-five-year term? This coalition will remain intact for a full five-year term. There will be changes in the government leadership but the parliament won’t be dissolved before it completes its full term. In our context, we have to accept a slightly different definition of political stability. Parliamentary stability should be the yardstick of political stability, instead of government’s. This is because previously, there was the provision of parliament dissolution before its full term, and such a provision still exists in many countries. But we have adopted a new provision that doesn’t allow the prime minister to dissolve the parliament. I want to assure everyone that this parliament will remain for five years. The current coalition will also remain intact. It’s only that the country will get three prime ministers in the next five years. Incumbent Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal will step down after 2.5 years to hand over the reins to CPN (Unified Socialist) Chairman Madhav Kumar Nepal, who will in turn cede the office to Nepali Congress President Sher Bahadur Deuba. The Deuba government will be in charge when the country heads for next general elections. This is a tentative agreement among coalition partners. What about the foreign policy priorities of this coalition government? Nepal’s foreign policy is not constant because there has always been some disparities and mistakes when a new government is formed. I want to say firmly that Nepal has two neighbors—India and China—and our relationship with India is a special one due to various factors such as language, culture, civilizational linkages, and open borders. These factors make our relationship with India entirely different than that of China. If we compare our relationship with two neighbors, it is obvious, we have to give more importance to India. Why is the relationship with India different from that of China? India has adopted “neighborhood first” policy but what does it really entail?  India should demonstrate this policy in practice. I do not know how this policy was coined but let me put some opinion on how neighbors are taken in our society. In Nepali, neighbor means ‘chhimeki’. With chhimeki, we have both bitter and cordial relationships but we do not take this bitter relationship to the point of enmity.  Relationships among chhimeki are not only about formal meetings and engagements. Informal engagement is equally important, and we engage in personal-level relationships with our chhimeki. On the one hand, there will be a respectful and formal relationship, on the other an informal, open and loose network. But our relationship with neighbors is going to become like a regimented barracks, which is not helpful for both countries. Indian leaders and people have always stood by our side in all our democratic movements. Similarly, Nepali leaders have supported the independence movement of India. We should not take open and frank discussions between Nepal and India as a dispute, or interference in internal affairs. When it comes to our relationship with China, there are cultural, linguistic and other disparities. China is a communist country, Nepal is a democratic country, and so is India. Cordial ties between two democracies are normal, just as China maintains good ties with other communist countries of the world. But since Nepal is not a communist country and is unlikely to become one, China should not conduct its foreign policy with the motive of bringing a communist regime in Kathmandu. It seems that India and China are competing to exert their influence in Kathmandu. What is your view on this?   There should not be competition between India and China in Kathmandu. Veteran Nepali Congress leaders Krishna Prasad Bhattarai, Ganesh Man Singh and Mahendra Naryan Nidhi used to say, “Chinese leaders are ready to provide us economic and other assistance but that is always lesser than what India is providing us.” There was a time when Chinese leaders used to advise our leaders to maintain a cordial relationship with India. I have personally experienced the spirit of such goodwill from senior Chinese leaders during my trip to Beijing in the past. They used to advise us to give due priority to our relationship with India. I can only hope that the Chinese leaders maintain that same spirit of friendship and cordiality today.

Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal has completed his 100 days in office, achieving very little both on domestic and international fronts. Most of his time and energy after coming to power on 25 December last year have gone in dealing with coalition partners and breaking and recomposing his government. Dahal skipped the meeting of LDC5 held last month and deputed Narayan Kaji Shrestha in lieu. He also turned down the invitation by China to attend the Boao Forum for Asia held on March 28-29 apparently in order to not irk India. Dahal has not embarked on any official foreign visit after his election, but it appears that he will do so with a visit to India, honoring the long-standing practice of Nepali prime ministers making their first trip to India first. During his first premiership in 2008, Dahal had broken this tradition by attending the Beijing Olympic Games, a move that didn’t go well with New Delhi. He would later tell his close confidants that it was his mistake to travel to Beijing before New Delhi. So when he became prime minister for the second time in 2016, he made it a point to visit New Delhi first. He is intent on honoring the tradition this time too, as was evident by his decision to not attend the Boao Forum for Asia held in Hainan Province of China. Although Dahal attended the Summit for Democracy, a virtual meet organized by the US, the Prime Minister’s Office saw to it that the meeting was portrayed as a low-key event, unlike in 2021 when former prime minister, Sher Bahadur Deuba, and his team issued a public statement regarding his address. It is said Prime Minister Dahal didn’t want to make a big deal out of the summit considering the current geopolitical climate. At the end of the summit, 73 countries came up with a joint statement but there is no mention of Nepal. Some countries including India have expressed reservations on some of the points of the statement but Nepal has kept mum. The main objective of the summit was to advance a democratic bloc to contain the growing global influence of communist China, and Prime Minister Dahal didn’t want to give any wrong message to Beijing by becoming an enthusiastic participant. Interestingly, a few days before the Summit for Democracy, China had organized ‘The Second International Forum on Democracy: Shared Human Values’, where it had invited politicians, experts, and scholars from around the world. There were no reports about Nepali government officials taking part in the event. The Dahal government faces a tough challenge of balancing ties with both the US and China. There is a dispute between the US and China on what and how democracy should be like. This conflict over the definition of democracy is playing out in countries like Nepal. American Ambassador Dean R Thompson on March 29 wrote a newspaper article to reinforce the importance of democracy, and the very next day, Chinese Ambassador Chen Song published his own opinion piece on the Chinese model of democracy, where he claimed the broadest, truest, and most effective democracy was truly rooted in China. With two global superpowers competing to exert their influence over Nepal, Prime Minister Dahal is treading carefully so as not to irritate Beijing or Washington by making his preference known.   As the US, China, and India are all crucial development partners of Nepal, it explains Prime Minister Dahal’s decision to skip Boao Forum for Asia meeting, his low-key participation in the Summit for Democracy, and his decision to make his first official visit to India. For now, Dahal’s first priority is to make an official visit to India. Time and again, he has publicly said that preparations are underway for his India trip. Soon after he became the prime minister, Dahal had talked about his plan to visit India, but it could not take place due to internal political issues. In February, Indian Foreign Secretary Vinay Mohan Kwatra visited Nepal to make preparations for Dahal’s India visit. Again, the prime minister was caught in internal political affairs. He will most likely visit India once his newly-formed coalition government gets full shape. After India, Prime Minister Dahal wants to visit China, but it is not sure whether Beijing will extend him an invitation. While extending its invitation to Dahal for the Boao Forum for Asia conference, China had expressed its intention of converting his trip into an official one. So, there is still hope that Beijing could invite Prime Minister Dahal for an official visit. It is clear that India, China and the US want to deepen their ties with Nepal on economic, political and military fronts. But for Dahal, balancing expectations of these three countries is going to be difficult, and not just because of their geopolitical rivalries, but also due to internal factors. For instance, Dahal could face pressure, including from the opposition party, CPN-UML, to take up the issues such as revising the 1950 treaty and settling the border dispute with India. New Delhi is certainly not keen on discussing these topics, let alone agreeing to settle them. The Indian side has said repeatedly that it wants sustained diplomatic talks on these issues before forwarding them at the top political level. Instead, India seems more interested in expediting the development partnership with Nepal, focusing on connectivity and hydropower projects. China too has shown its interest in increasing its engagements with Nepal that were obstructed due to the Covid-19 restrictions and the lack of interest shown by the former government under Sher Bahadur Deuba of the Nepali Congress. To this end, Chinese Ambassador Song has adopted an on-the-spot approach on bilateral issues related to trade and development projects. Recently, China also agreed to fully open all border points to ease bilateral trade. For the US, the key priorities are smooth implementation of the projects under the Millennium Challenge Corporation (MCC) Nepal compact, bringing Nepal on board its State Partnership Program (SPP), concluding the transitional justice process, and expediting the activities under USAID.  While India, China and the US seem to have made their priorities known, Nepal has no clarity on how to deal with the interests shown by these countries and how to benefit from them. Nepali society remains sharply divided over some of the programs and projects launched by the US and China, largely due to the fear sowed by the political parties. It is up to Prime Minister Dahal to convince all sides. This will be his biggest challenge, especially when the political ideologies and foreign policies of his coalition partners are at odds with his own party.

In a next few days, Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal will complete his 100-day honeymoon period in office. And it is almost certain that his performance evaluation report is not going to be a rosy one. Even if one were to argue that Prime Minister Dahal had to deal with a lot of political entanglements and thus he was unable to focus on the works of his government, he cannot be spared from criticism. The Maoist prime minister came to power with the support of the CPN-UML even though his party had forged an electoral alliance with the Nepali Congress. He then went on to ditch the UML within two months and once again sided with the NC. As a result, Dahal had to take the vote of confidence on two occasions after being elected the prime minister on December 25 last year. His government is yet to get a full shape. While some of his Cabinet members, including Minister for Physical Infrastructure and Transport Narayan Kaji Shrestha, have come up with a three-month progress report of the government, and the Prime Minister’s Secretariat is also planning to publicize its own performance report, any independent observer will tell you that the Dahal government has very little to show for. The overall performance of the government has been dismal. After the UML, Rastriya Prajatantra Party and Rastriya Swatantra Party quit the government, some of the key ministries were left without their heads. As a result, the works of the ministries and their line agencies were affected. At one point, Dahal was in charge of 16 ministries. In the first week of January, a week after taking charge of office, Prime Minister Dahal issued a 30-point directive to government secretaries, urging them to take immediate steps to improve service delivery at government offices. He went so far to give a 30-day ultimatum to the secretaries to make the services smooth or face action. The slew of instructions did little to change the historically sluggish bureaucracy of Nepal. Prime Minister Dahal declared at an event on Wednesday that his government was on track to deliver better services to the people and that they will get better after the Cabinet expansion. He also assured that he will remain in power for a full five-year term, even though his coalition partners, NC and CPN (Unified Socialist), have been saying that there will be a change of premiership after two years. The new coalition government is busy giving final touches to its Common Minimum Program (CMP), but there is little hope that it will buoy the people who burdened by inflation, high cost-of-living, unemployment, and failing economy. Prime Minister Dahal and his key coalition partner Sher Bahadur Deuba of the NC have yet to show the political willingness to address the problems that the country is facing today. The ruling parties are busy in talks for the expansion of the Cabinet, and there are doubts that Dahal can manage the 10 parties and deliver good and stable governance. Since being elected the prime minister, Dahal has spent most of his time in political negotiations and attending public programs here and there. He hasn’t provided enough time to look after the affairs of the ministries under him. The ongoing Cabinet expansion talks will likely cause a serious discord inside the Maoist and the NC because there are many ministerial aspirants, says one Maoist leader. He fears the government’s time and energy could be spent on managing the disputes within and between the ruling parties in the days to come. The Dahal government has also failed to provide business to Parliament. Raghuji Pant, leader of the opposition party, UML, says the House is without business not because of the lawmakers, but because of the government and its ministers who are neglecting Parliament. The government did recently present the bill to amend transitional justice laws, but it is facing stiff opposition. Similarly, the Dahal government has also not taken any measures to address the problem faced by the country’s judiciary, which is without its head for a long time. On foreign policy front, too, Prime Minister Dahal seems undecided. Two of Nepal’s key neighbors, India and China, have been closely following the activities of this government, but Dahal so far seems content managing the internal power struggle. He is expected to visit India soon but the date has not been fixed yet. After his India visit, the prime minister is likely to visit China—then again, nothing has been decided so far. Soon after the formation of the government under Dahal, there was a flurry of visits to Nepal from high-level officials of major countries. But the government could not create an environment of trust to attract foreign investment and assistance. Despite the increased visits and interests of major powers, Nepal’s foreign assistance is declining. Even after three months in power, Dahal has not even appointed a foreign policy advisor, which says a lot about his attitude toward international relations. Political analyst Puranjan Acharya says it is hard to be optimistic about the Dahal-led government. The main thing, he says, is that Prime Minister Dahal does not have a strong mandate to lead the government because his party polled third in the general elections. Despite strong backing from the NC, the largest party in Parliament, it is hard to believe that this government can bring positive changes, he adds.

On Feb 19, the CPN-UML launched ‘Mission Grassroots’, a campaign designed to strengthen and expand the party organization across the country. Under the program, the party has deployed its central leaders in all 753 local units. The UML came up with the campaign soon after the general elections of Nov 20 last year. Despite the electoral alliance between the Nepali Congress and the CPN (Maoist Center), the UML performed fairly well, coming in second after the NC. Compared to other parties, mainly the NC and the Maoists, the UML already has a strong organizational base from central to local levels. The party wants to get stronger with the latest campaign, which will run until April. The party has deployed its leaders outside their home constituencies so that they could better identify where the problems are and come up with ways to fix them. Even the party chair, KP Sharma Oli, and other senior leaders are attending the programs being held at the local level. A high-level team consisting of the party vice-chairman, general secretary and other office bearers is overseeing the campaign. According to an official document of the party, based on the key findings of the campaign, the team will prepare a review report and submit it to the party leadership. The UML will then prepare for the annual party program based on the review report submitted by the team. The mission has a simple task, says UML leader Raghuji Panta, which is to involve more youths in the party. As one of the largest political parties, it is difficult to run the party’s affairs smoothly, he adds while noting that the mission like this helps the UML connect with the people at the grassroots. The mission aims to bridge the gap between youths, laymen, and the party leadership, enabling the party to work for the people more effectively, says Panta. The UML has become the first party to run its affairs in a systematic way after last year’s general elections.  Two other major parties—the NC and the Maoist Center—meanwhile are riven by factional politics and caught in an organizational mess. Asked why the UML felt the need to connect with the grassroots, leaders say a couple of factors forced them to pay special attention to the way the main party and sister organizations were functioning across the country. First is the vertical split in the UML after its former leader Madhav Kumar Nepal went on to form his own party, CPN (Unified Socialist), in 2022. If not for the split, the UML was confident of becoming the largest party, ahead of the NC. With the campaign, the UML leadership hopes to bring back the party supporters and cadres who defected to the Unified Socialist. Second reason behind the UML campaign is to assuage the discontent among the voters. Among the political parties, there is a tendency to ignore the grassroots level once the election season is over. This has created a serious public dissatisfaction against mainstream political parties. The UML wants to placate the public by sending its leaders to the grassroots to bridge the divide between the party and the ordinary voters. In the last election, the UML had many problems including intra-party betrayal and non-cooperation from voters at its own political base, which eventually cost the party the election in some constituencies. One UML leader says the party wants to rule out the repetition of such problems in future elections. Another factor that prompted the UML to launch the campaign is the emergence of new political forces like the Rastriya Swatantra Party, and the revival of old ones, like the Rastriya Prajatantra Party. A chunk of UML and NC votes were lost to the RSP in last year’s general elections. The RSP managed to win 20 seats in the Parliament, which is a lot for a new party. If the party does not get serious about reviving the people’s trust, it will lose more supporters in future, says a UML leader. As the UML’s efforts to unite, or at least forge a working alliance with the Maoist party have already failed twice, the party is planning to contest all future elections alone. The party leadership is planning to secure a majority in the upcoming elections without the help of an electoral alliance. UML Chairman Oli told the party supporters at his home constituency in Jhapa recently that the mission was launched with the purpose of securing 51 percent votes in the next elections. Some UML leaders say as the party has been relegated to the opposition benches with the latest decision of Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal to ally with the NC, they now have time to focus on building the party’s organizational strength. They are of the view that as the coalition government led by Dahal will not be able to deliver much, its failure will play in favor of the UML. Major purposes of the campaign

•   Distributing and renewing party membership
•   Identifying local problems
•   Identifying internal issues
•   Encouraging youths to join UML
•   Strengthening party committees

Chinese President Xi Jinping's Belt and Road initiative (BRI) has entered its 10th year. On this occasion, China is preparing to hold the third international BRI conference—the first two were held in 2017 and 2019—by inviting world leaders to Beijing. Over the past decade, BRI has generated several debates and controversies, mainly surrounding its investment terms and conditions. China is aware of the BRI’s reputation on international stage, so it is poised to make an amendment to its original plan and rebrand the program as the BRI 2.0, of which little is known about. Nepal became a BRI member in 2017, and China wants to create a positive public opinion on BRI here. While Western countries have tried to sway Nepali leaders and policymakers by highlighting the debt issue of the BRI, Beijing is trying to override this narrative by portraying the program as a force of greater good, of development and prosperity. Critics of BRI say it is a ‘debt trap’ lacking in transparency and that it ‘spoils the investment climate’ and contributes to cross-border corruption. Those in favor meanwhile are of the view that Nepal can exploit immense benefit from the program. These two competing narratives regarding the BRI have paralyzed Nepali leaders. They see it as a tool to bridge the funding gap for infrastructure development as well as a potential debt trap. In essence, they have imprecise and superficial understanding of the program. This could be because of a lack of effective communication between experts and leaders, and also between the governments of Nepal and China. The Pokhara International Airport is a case in point. When Nepal objected to China’s listing of the airport under the BRI, there was no attempt at clarification from the Chinese side. A senior Chinese official says: “Obviously, it is a BRI project and we are firm on it. But if Nepal says it is not under the BRI, that is okay for us too.” This begs the question: What does BRI mean for Nepal? Or, more importantly: Is there a proper understanding in Nepal on BRI? Even after ten years, the Nepal government has not been able to make a concrete view and position on the program. A lot of confusion and ambiguity remains in the academic circle as well as in the government. Chinese officials say there are five pillars of BRI: policy coordination, infrastructure, unimpeded trade, financial integration, and connecting people. But much of its focus in Nepal has been on the infrastructure component. The fact is that China has invested billions in connectivity and energy projects mainly in the Global South, and mega projects have been built in many countries including high-speed railway. Of late, the BRI is gradually shifting towards soft power. Ambar Malik, Chinese development finance expert, told Voice of America in an interview that the BRI is not a single entity, but rather an umbrella under which many entities are delivering projects in many countries across many sectors. “China has now also folded a lot of their cultural initiatives — their educational initiatives, scholarships, Confucius Institute and others — into this big juggernaut of the Belt and Road Initiative,” he said in the interview. Chinese experts are of the view that the BRI faced challenges from the Covid-19 pandemic, geopolitical conflict and supply chain shocks, which needs to be settled for the coming decade. In Nepal, as the BRI discussions are overly centered on infrastructure projects, it does not offer a full picture of the program. Some experts say discussions focused on infrastructure projects is one reason why the debt trap is finding purchase among the intelligentsia and the public. The ‘debt trap’ argument could be the reason why former prime minister Sher Bahadur Deuba of the Nepali Congress reportedly told the Chinese side that Nepal cannot take loan under the BRI. The senior Chinese official that ApEx talked with says there are some flaws in Nepal on how to view BRI, which has created a misleading narrative. Over the past few years, China has come up with three new initiatives— Global Security initiative (GSI), Global Development initiative (GDI) and Global Civilizational initiative (GCI)—which Chinese officials say fall under the BRI umbrella. The GDI is being implemented in coordination with the UN agencies while GCI is a new concept. As for the GSI, it necessitates an understanding between two countries before implementing any programs under it.   Some experts say these programs are Beijing’s way of recalibrating the BRI, which faced many hurdles in the past 10 years due to the commercially unviable projects, Covid-19 pandemic, economic crisis and climate change issues.  Malik says the era of cheap money with low interest rates and large-scale megaprojects is likely over, hence the advent of BRI 2.0. This could also be the reason why China is not forcing Nepal to select projects under the BRI, and repeatedly asking to come up with commercially viable projects that would help change the living standard of Nepalis. Experts say China will continue to invest in the infrastructure development of the Global South under the new version of the BRI. According to the Chinese Foreign Ministry, over the last decade, the BRI galvanized nearly $1 trillion in investments and established more than 3,000 new cooperative projects, creating 420,000 jobs for the countries and regions involved, and lifting approximately 40 million people out of poverty. Nepal and China are working to conclude an implementation plan for the BRI. But unless Nepali leaders make a concrete view on it, the program cannot move ahead. There is also a need for consensus among major parties, so that the Nepal and China are on the same page.    

As many as 144,527 cases are awaiting verdicts in different courts of the country. According to the Annual Report of the Supreme Court for fiscal year 2020/21, a lion's share of these cases are with district courts. The report shows district courts have 91,186 pending cases. These courts settled only 54.56 percent of the 200,681 cases during the review year. The Supreme Court had the lowest settlement rate in fiscal year 2020/21. It was able to resolve only 5,689 out of 33,466 cases, leaving 27,777 pending cases. Under the 2015 Constitution, the court system consists of the Supreme Court, high courts in seven provinces, and district courts in 77 districts. There are also three specialized courts, including the Special Court for corruption cases, the Labor Court for labor-related issues, and the Administrative Court for disputes related to the exercise of public power, as well as four tribunals, which handle foreign employment, revenue, debt recovery, and debt recovery appeals. The high courts had the highest settlement rate among the courts, resolving 59.39 percent of the 56,417 cases under their jurisdiction during the review year. District courts settled 54.56 percent of the 200,681 cases. According to the report, the combined number of pending cases under the specialized courts and tribunals stands at 2,651. The Revenue Tribunal has the highest number of pending cases, while the Debt Recovery Appellate Tribunal has the lowest. The Special Court, responsible for handling corruption cases, was able to settle 57.06 percent of the cases during the review period. However, the report indicates that the court still has 657 pending cases. In terms of the types of cases, divorce cases account for 11.43 percent of all cases in Nepali courts, followed by property disputes (11.37 percent), financial transactions (8.87 percent), land disputes (6.68 percent), fraud (5.53 percent), ‘likhat badar’ (4.8 percent), banking offenses (3.65 percent), rape (3.23 percent), culpable homicide (2.09 percent), and accidents caused by motor vehicles (1.74 percent), according to the report. The report further reveals that the number of pending cases has been steadily rising in the Supreme Court over the past decade. In the fiscal year 2010/11, the apex court had 12,714 pending cases, which more than doubled to 27,777 by the end of 2020/21. The number of pending cases in high courts also doubled over the same period. In 2010/11, the high courts had 11,382 pending cases, which grew to 22,913 in 2020/21. The report further indicates that the number of pending cases in district courts has increased by over 100 percent. In 2010/11, district courts had 40,350 pending cases, which has now surged to 91,077. The number of pending cases at the specialized courts and tribunals has also doubled. The report states that these courts had 1,379 pending cases in 2010/11, which rose to 2,630 in 2020/21. In terms of targets set by the fourth five-year strategic plan of the judiciary, the Okhaldhunga Bench of Biratnagar High Court was the best performing court, settling 113.7 percent of the targets. The Dipayal High Court was next on the list as it achieved 103.28 percent of the targets in terms of case settlements. Likewise, the Tulsipur High Court, Surkhet High Court, Hetauda Bench of Patan High Court, and Mahendranagar Bench of Dipayal High Court achieved more than 75 percent of the targets in terms of case settlement.The high courts were given targets of settling 35,018 cases during the period of which they settled 59.45 percent of them or 20,817 cases. Among the district courts, Bajura, Mustang, Achham, Dadeldurha, Salyan, Jajarkot, Gulmi, Arghakhanchi, Rolpa, and Manang achieved more than 100 percent progress in case settlements. District courts achieved 59.31 percent progress during the review period. Province-wise, Bagmati had the highest number of cases (19,644) among the 56,417 cases under high courts, while Karnali had the lowest number of cases at only 1,286. Former Supreme Court justice Prakash Wasti says one of the major reasons behind the increasing backlog is a lack of sufficient human resources. The other reason is the lack of willingness on the part of judges to settle the cases. He suspects some judges fear they will court controversies if they settle more cases. Besides, Wasti says, there are no extra incentives to judges for settling more cases. Of late, there is a tendency of handing down verdicts in only those cases that are of national interest. Wasti says judges and justices are only interested in those cases that could make national headlines. He adds in many cases, judges and justices seem to lack the study and understanding required to settle cases concerning critical issues. As a result, he says many cases are put on hold, because the judges and justices do not want to get caught delivering flawed judgment. Former Supreme Court justice Balaram KC says the low number of judges in the court is a primary reason behind increasing case backlogs. He suggests introducing a lead lawyer system in the court, so that there is no need for all lawyers to speak for hours. KC adds there is also a need to develop a system, where judges and justices are well-prepared to intervene in the hearing process. He says as people have little trust in high courts these days, the Supreme Court is getting crowded. We should work to provide more business to the high courts, says KC.

The government has tabled a bill to amend the Enforced Disappearances Enquiry, Truth, and Reconciliation Act in Parliament. In many ways, if not exclusively, this move was prompted by a case filed at the Supreme Court against Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal for a public admission three years ago that his party would take responsibility for the deaths of 5,000 people killed during a decade-long insurgency. It is hard to believe that the 10-party ruling alliance took the bill to Parliament to actually give a fresh impetus to the stalled transitional justice process. Many conflict victims see the move as a gambit to influence the court rather than an earnest attempt to conclude the long overdue transitional justice process. They have a valid reason to be suspicious. For one, the parties have made no effort to change some controversial provisions in the proposed legislation. The bill proposes amnesty on even serious human rights violations including murder, rape and torture cases. Some say the bill tabled in Parliament is barely any different than the previous one, which was widely criticized on the ground that it would deprive justice to victims. Conflict victims, rights activists, and the international community, among others, have raised objections to some provisions of the bill. A protest assembly was held in Maitighar Mandala, Kathmandu, on Sunday as the government tabled the bill in Parliament. Nepal’s transitional justice mechanisms—Truth and Reconciliation and Disappearance Commission—cannot make any progress unless conflict victims, rights activists and the international community take ownership of the process. But political parties are trying to conclude the transitional justice process on their own terms, ignoring the concerns raised by the conflict victims and other stakeholders. The major political parties—Nepali Congress, CPN-UML and CPN (Maoist Center)—are committing yet another blunder in the transitional justice process. The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) has expressed serious objection to the government’s move to table the bill. The constitutional rights body has said the proposed legislation has been presented in Parliament without a broad consultation with stakeholders, and without amending the disputed provisions in line with the 2015 Supreme Court verdict. NHRC is of the view that there should be amendments on the issue of reparations, prosecution, appointment process of commissions, issue of child soldiers, and matters relating to jurisdiction of courts. Suman Adhikari, who leads a campaign of conflict victims, says the current bill has the provisions of adopting reconciliation even in cases of serious human rights violations committed during the conflict era. He warns that passing the law in haste amid widespread dissatisfaction among the conflict victims could further complicate and prolong the transitional justice process. There is also the chance of more lawsuits being filed by the conflict victims against Prime Minister Dahal and his party leaders. It is not helping that the Maoist and its splinter parties are threatening the court and others raising the issue of war-era human rights violations. Such an attitude will only reinforce the perception that the Maoists are not committed to concluding the transitional justice process. Ganesh Datta Bhatta, former chair of Truth and Reconciliation Commission, says there is always a lack of trust between conflict victims and the government. He is of the view that all the concerns of conflict victims could not be addressed if the government were to take the conflict victims into confidence. He says if the environment of distrust continues to fester, there is a risk of conflict-victims snubbing the entire transitional justice process. The only prudent way to conclude the transitional justice process is to amend the transitional laws in a way that addresses the concerns of all stakeholders. It may not be possible to satisfy each and every individual, but the major concerns pointed out by the conflict victims, rights activists, court and the international community must be addressed. It is also vital to ensure that the two transitional justice bodies are free, independent and autonomous. It is a fact that due to the flawed appointment process, these two bodies, since 2015, have failed to make substantial progress on their tasks. They have received around 65,000 complaints, but completed the preliminary investigations of only a few cases. The two transitional justice commissions must be allowed to work without political interference to independently investigate every single complaint. In the past, there have been several instances of top politicians exerting pressure on the commissions to stop the investigation of certain cases. If the Dahal government is really committed to taking the transitional justice process and the peace process to its logical conclusion, it has to make a substantial progress. The international community has renewed its interest in Nepal's stalled transitional justice process after Dahal became prime minister in December last year. It has been more than 15 years since the seven-party alliance and the Maoists signed the Comprehensive Peace Agreement, but the transitional justice process has barely made any significant progress so far. The government is now planning to fast-track the bill from Parliament, which doesn’t give lawmakers sufficient time to study and deliberate the proposed legislation on transitional justice. As the government has already presented the bill in Parliament, the only way ahead is to form a parliamentary committee to revise the controversial provisions after consulting all stakeholders. Meanwhile, political parties should also revisit their past actions to examine what went wrong in the last eight years, after the formation of the two commissions, and find out ways to remedy those mistakes. Bhatta, the former chair of Truth and Reconciliation Commission, says the onus lies on Parliament and its members to hold intensive discussion on the bill before its endorsement. Parliamentary committees have not been formed yet, which are responsible for holding discussions on important legislations. If the bill endorsement is hurried, Bhatta says there will be serious, long-term implications, which could jeopardize Nepal’s peace process.

Corruption continues to thrive at all three levels of government, despite the anti-graft body’s claim of having a strong monitoring mechanism in place. Hardly any day goes by when there is no incident of corruption, mainly concerning civil servants taking a bribe, in the media. Senior journalist Hari Bahadur Thapa says news stories about bribery that comes in the media are usually minor ones, and that there are much larger corruption cases taking place in the shadows. Thapa suspects the Commission for the Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA) is deliberately turning its attention away from big cases because of high-level political involvement. “The CIAA is failing to catch big fishes. It has abandoned the investigation of big scandals involving political leaders and focusing only on small cases,” he says. “This is because all the state mechanisms have been captured by the political parties.” After a long gap, the Special Court in Kathmandu last week slapped two former ministers—Badri Prasad Neupane and Tek Bahadur Gurung— with nine-year jail terms and Rs 12m fine. But it was a one-off case of politicians getting convicted of corruption in the country. In Nepal, even courts are known to delay the hearing of cases involving politicians or those people who have high-level political connections. A cursory look at the CIAA documents also shows where its focus lies when it comes to curbing and investigating corruption cases. People are registering more and more complaints with the CIAA.  A majority of complaints (4,459) received by the commission in the fiscal year in 2021/22 were in the form of written applications. Complaints were also recorded via postal service, e-mail, and directly to the CIAA website. Around half of the complaints (50.55percent), which also include those from previous fiscal years, are currently under investigation at the CIAA central office. Among the various regional offices of the anti-graft body, the highest number of complaints is being handled by the Bardibas office (8.68percent), while the Nepalgunj office (3.07percent) and Pokhara office (4.59 percent) have the lowest number of complaints, according to the report. Likewise, the Kathmandu head office of the CIAA has settled the highest number of complaints (9,509) compared to its branches. Among the offices outside of Kathmandu, the Butuwal office had the highest percentage of settled complaints (84.52 percent), while the Bardibas office had the highest number of settled complaints (1,196).  The Itahari office of the CIAA settled the fewest number of complaints in terms of percentage (53.36 percent), while the Nepalgunj office had the fewest number of settled complaints (524). The report also showed that approximately half of the complaints filed at both the head office and regional offices of the CIAA were against the local governments and their agencies (47.08 percent). About 40.96percent of the complaints were against agencies under the federal government. In terms of provinces, the highest number of complaints was received against the offices in Bagmati, followed by Madhes, Lumbini, and Koshi. Number of corruption complaints against provincial government offices in Gandaki, Karnali, and Sudurpashchim was comparatively fewer. In terms of agencies under provincial and local governments, the highest number of complaints has been filed in Madhes (28.10 percent), while the lowest was in Gandaki (8.47 percent). Lumbini accounted for 15 percent, Sudurpashchim 13.73 percent, and Koshi 12.79 percent of the total number of complaints filed. Bagmati and Karnali accounted for 11.78 percent and 10 percent respectively. The report also showed that complaints against sectors such as federal affairs, education, health, land administration, forest and environment, physical infrastructure, and home affairs were comparatively higher. A significant number of complaints were related to fake academic certificates and amassing of illegal properties. In terms of sector-wise distribution, complaints in federal affairs (including local government) were the highest (33.14 percent), followed by education (15.31 percent); land administration (7.71 percent), forest and environment (4.62 percent); health and population (3.99 percent); physical infrastructure and transport (3.88 percent); home administration (3.75 percent); tourism, industry and commerce (3.23 percent); energy, water resources and irrigation (3.09 percent); water supply and urban development (2.98 percent); finance and revenue (1.96 percent); agriculture and livestock (1.88 percent); and communication and information technology (0.99 percent). After preliminary investigation, the CIAA head office settled 9,509 (77.31 percent) of the 12,300 complaints filed in 2021/22, said the report. The commission’s branch offices settled 7,660 (63.67 percent) out of 12,031 complaints. In total, the CIAA settled 17,169 (70.56 percent) out of 24,331 complaints recorded during the fiscal year 2021/22. The remaining 7,162 complaints have been carried over for 2022/23. In 2021/22, following a comprehensive investigation, the CIAA decided to register charge sheets in 130 complaints. Including one charge sheet decided in 2020/21, the commission filed a total of 131 charge sheets at the Special Court in 2021/22. Additionally, the anti-graft commission issued 80 suggestions and 17 written instructions, while 637 complaints are in the notice service process. It also took 41 other decisions. In 2021/22, the CIAA held 79 meetings and made 975 decisions related to filing charge-sheets, appeals, reviews, dispositions, and pending of investigation, among other matters. Of the 131 cases charge-sheeted in 2021/22, 35 were related to causing damage to public property, 34 to seeking illegal benefits, and 32 to corruption. Seven cases were related to illegal amassing of properties, six to fake academic certificates, five to revenue leakage, and 12 to other offenses. In 2021/22, the CIAA also filed appeals at the Supreme Court against decisions of the Special Court in 57 cases. A total of 637 complaints — 42 against illegal amassing of properties and 595 others — filed in 2021/22 have been kept in disposition as per Clause 19 (12) of CIAA Act, 1991, and Rule 10 CIAA Regulations, 2002. The performance of the Special Court, through which cases related to corruption are settled, is dismal. For instance in the fiscal year 2078/79, altogether 792 cases were filed, but the court delivered on only 339 of them. Most of the cases filed at the Special Court are related to illegal earning, policy corruption, fake certificate, bribery, and money laundering. Nepal was ranked in the 110th position out of 180 countries in the corruption perception index report of Transparency International in 2022. The country had ranked at 117th spot in 2021. But despite the year-by-year improvement in corruption perception, observers say it does not take account of irregularities that are happening at the local level. They say corruption and irregularities are thriving at provincial and local levels, and there are no reliable mechanisms to check them. This is true particularly in development projects, which have boomed in provinces after Nepal adopted federalism. According to the National Vigilance Center (NVC), corruption has flourished mainly in big development projects. In one of its reports, the NVC states that the quality of big infrastructure projects is seriously compromised due to nexus between politicians and contractors. To check the quality of infrastructure projects, NVC has set up laboratories but it falls short of sufficient human and other resources. Padmini Pradhananga, president of Transparency International Nepal, says anti-graft agencies in Nepal are not paying attention to the corruption happening at the local level. “We are receiving complaints that corruption and irregularities are happening in the health, education and construction sectors,” says. “There are also reports of the CIAA keeping big corruption scandals on hold and investigating only small cases.”