Though the Ministry of Law and Justice updated 210 Acts as per republican structure through the “Act on Strengthening the Republic and Amending Laws”, hundreds of other regulations have still not been updated in similar fashion. [break]
The government had decided to amend Acts and Regulations to change terms, terminologies and irrelevant language following the abolition of monarchy.
Words like kingdom, His Majesty, Panchayat and Royal (RAJAKIYA) were mentioned in the old Acts and Regulations. Such words have already been removed from the Acts but the terminologies have not yet been replaced by new words to suit the changed political context.
“We have been facing a number of difficulties due to obsolete regulations. First, whenever we read provisions incorporated in the regulations, we feel very odd,” a source said, adding, “It is a matter of shame to fail to update the regulations even three years after the country was declared a republic.”
“We are very serious about the matter. All the regulations should have been updated much earlier as per the spirit of republican structure,” said Law and Justice Secretary Madhav Paudel, adding, “We have already spoken to Chief Secretary Madhav Ghimire regarding the seriousness of the matter.”
Secretary Paudel had raised serious concern over the matter at a secretaries´ meeting held recently. Following Secretary Paudel´s expression of concern, Chief Secretary Ghimire had instructed all the secretaries to immediately update and improve the regulations within a month as per the changed political context.
Secretaries were asked to update regulations related to their ministries. Almost all the regulations were formulated by various ministries in order to bring the Acts into full-fledged implementation.
A source at the Office of the Prime Minister and Council of Ministers (PMO), however, told Republica that the chief secretary´s instruction has gone largely unheeded. “Not one secretary has so far informed the PMO regarding the improvement in regulations,” the source added.
Law Ministry officials said that the failure to update the regulations has tarnished the image of Nepal´s bureaucracy. “We have seen allegations that our bureaucracy is reluctant to own up the republican structure,” said Paudel, adding, “There might be another serious problem if we have to publish regulations.”
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