KATHMANDU, Sept 4: A bill drafted by the Ministry of Federal Affairs and General Administration proposes barring the local units from recruiting civil servants on their own.
Revising the draft bill prepared to replace the Civil Service Act with the Federal Civil Service Bill, the ministry has barred the local units from recruiting civil servants themselves. The ministry has argued that the constitution has envisioned only federal and provincial service commissions for recruitment civil servants.
The Ministry of Law had prepared the draft bill allowing the local units to recruit civil servants on their own.
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Although the bill is yet to be approved, several local units have already recruited civil servants saying they themselves enjoy the right to appoint civil servants in the context of three-tier government in operation under the federal setup.
“Constitutionally, the local bodies have no power to recruit civil servants. Only the federal and provincial governments enjoy that sort of power,” said Suresh Kumar Adhikari, spokesperson at the Ministry of Federal Affairs and General Administration, adding, “That’s why we have included the provision of mandating the rights only to the federal and provincial commissions, not to the local units.”
Spokesperson Adhikari claimed that the ministry had previously issued a circular to all the local units to recruit only technicians on contract basis. But the local units violated the provision and recruited civil servants on their own after there was shortage of employees at the local level.
The ministry forwarded the revised draft bill to the cabinet some four days ago for approval. The bill will be tabled at the parliament once it gets approval from the cabinet.
“Let’s see how the cabinet and parliament will deal with it,” said Spokesperson Adhikari.
