"The cabinet decided to direct the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to introduce the machine readable passports by April 1 through bilateral negotiations in an economical way. The cabinet has sent back the ministry’s proposal," said Home Minister Bhim Rawal, emerging from the cabinet.[break]
While passing the directive, the cabinet did not name any specific country but said that the work should be gotten done at a competitive price, a senior minister told Republica on condition of anonymity.
But Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Foreign Affairs Sujata Koirala said that her ministry would give the multi-million MRP project to the southern neighbor despite its most expensive offer. India has proposed to supply machine readable passports to Nepal at a price of 200 Indian rupees (approx 4.35 US dollar) a piece.
We will give it to India: Sujata
At present, at least five security printers, including two state-owned firms each from India and Indonesia, have expressed interest in supplying the machine readable passports. The offer from an Indonesian government company is the cheapest – 3.5 US dollar a piece.
"A minister is soon visiting India for negotiations," Koirala told Republica while emerging from the cabinet.
The cabinet decision on machine readable passports came hours after the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) of parliament directed the ministry to revive the aborted international bidding for the MRP project. On December 15 last year, the ministry had cancelled the bidding process, citing technical reasons, though four international security printers had been short-listed for the bidding.
The committee termed the decision of Foreign Secretary Madan Kumar Bhattarai as illegal and irrelevant while directing the government and the ministry to inform it of the work progress from time to time.
But the cabinet did not take notice of the PAC directive.
"I do not know about the [PAC] directive," said Koirala.
Nepal, as a member of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), a UN agency, is required to introduce machine readable passports by April 1. Any non-machine readable passports to be issued will be considered invalid for international travel after that date though passports issued by March 31 will be acceptable till November 24, 2015.
Meanwhile, a source at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs has disclosed to Republica that the Indian government-owned Security Printing and Minting Corporation has expressed its inability to supply the MRPs by April 1.
"Officials of the corporation told us that the corporation needs a minimum of two to two-and-half months to deliver MRPs to Nepal," said a MoFA official who was in a six-member technical team that visited New Delhi to prepare an assessment report.
But the technical team hid this fact while presenting its assessment report to the ministry, the member said on condition of anonymity.
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