So much so, reforms commitment expressed in policies and programs such as petroleum sector liberalization did not feature in the budget. [break]
“Reforms initiated in two large public banks - Rastriya Banijya Bank and Nepal Bank Limited - will be continued,” said Pandey, presenting the budget in the parliament on Monday. He also announced measures to encourage loan defaulters to repay their loans and promised to implement an action plan to inject required capital in the banks within the next two years.
However, Pandey failed to present strong commitments to labor reforms. He remained silent on labor commission and other steps mooted by the past governments to achieve labor reforms.
Rather the budget gave emphasis on job security. The budget, however, promised to put in place legal arrangement to compensate industries from losses incurred due to highway closures. “The organizers of such bandas will be made to compensate the industries.”
In a bid to enhance service delivery, the budget announced the program of registering all land records in computers at 68 Land Revenue Offices within the new fiscal year, and awarding land-ownership certificate through computer.
Under the public transport and management reform, the budget announced that an electronic record management of drivers´ license will be completed the next fiscal year and new vehicle registration, route permit and driver´s license will be distributed and renewed electronically starting from November 16, 2009.
Pandey also promised to put in place special facilitation measures at the international airport for the departure and arrival of the overseas workers.
In order to motivate the traffic police to fully enforce traffic rules, he proposed to raise the existing penalty for the defaulters by 25 percent and make a provision to distribute the additional amount raised to the traffic police concerned as an incentive.
He unveiled "People´s Residences Program", offering low cost modern houses in Siraha, Saptari and Kapilvastu districts to provide housing facilities to 1,000 households in each district to disadvantaged and underprivileged communities such as Dom, Musahar, Chamar, Dusadh, Khatwe, other Dalits and Muslims.
Pandey admitted public enterprises have been adding liability to the state, however, he refrained from citing privatization, which was once among the top priority of the government.
Under the Public Enterprises (PEs) Reform program, he rather pushed for increasing the people´s ownership in the PEs and hydropower projects to be built by state-owned enterprises.
As an initiation of reform in the judiciary sector, he allocated Rs 1.41 billion for strengthening the capacity of the judiciary, which is still traditional.
In a step to cushion low-income group, the budget allocated Rs 7.78 billion for social security purposes. It also introduced a grant of Rs 100,000 to encourage inter caste marriage and Rs 50,000 to promote widow marriage.
The government also vowed reforms to make public administration accountable, capable, impartial, transparent and compatible with state restructuring.
“Strategic plan against corruption will be implemented strictly and policy of zero tolerance will be adopted besides strengthening Commission for the Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA) and National Vigilance Center and other agencies concerned with justice management,” said Pandey.
prabhakar@myrepublica.com
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