Kathmandu, August 5

The month-long obstruction of House of Representatives came to an end today after the ruling and opposition parties agreed to form a seven-member special parliamentary committee to recommend ways to avert disruptions of House meetings in the future.

The House resumed its meeting today after all the parliamentary parties, including ruling Nepal Communist Party (NCP) and opposition Nepali Congress and Rastriya Janata Party-Nepal, agreed to form Study and Recommendation Parliamentary Special Committee under NCP deputy parliamentary leader Subas Chandra Nembang.

Other members of the committee are: Dev Gurung and Binda Pandey from NCP, Minendra Rijal and Pushpa Bhusal from NC, Laxman Lal Karna from RJP-N and Uma Shankar Argariya from Samajwadi Party-Nepal.

The committee, formed on the basis of a provision in the parliamentary regulation, will hand over its report within 30 days of launching its investigation.

The committee will study problems that led to obstruction of House meetings and recommend ways to prevent such incidents in the future. “The committee will go through the constitution, rules and traditions and recommend ways to prevent House disruptions in the future,” Speaker Krishna Bahadur Mahara said. The committee will draft a committee operation guideline under the supervision of the speaker before commencing its work.

The House of Representatives had not been able to hold its meetings since July 10 except on July 24 when discussion on devastation caused by floods and landslides was held after the

Nepali Congress registered a motion of public importance. The House meetings were obstructed after NC and RJP-N demanded formation of a parliamentary panel to investigative two cases of alleged extra-judicial killings in Sarlahi district.

Sarlahi district in-charge of the Netra Bikram Chand-led outfit Kumar Paudel was killed in an alleged encounter with police on June 20. Later, an 11-year-boy died in a pond created by people operating illegal crusher and sand mining businesses. When peaceful demonstrations were held to protest the boy’s murder, Saroj Narayan Singh was killed in police firing on the East-West Highway on June 30.

Opposition parties had insisted that a panel be formed to investigate these deaths by the House itself stating they were cases of human rights violation but ruling party members argued that existing parliamentary committees should take up these issues.

“The speaker has played a crucial role to end the obstruction of House proceedings,” said NC Whip Pushpa Bhusal. “But the NC wants to make it clear that it won’t support any kind of criminal activity or human rights violation.”

Mahara initially called a meeting of all parliamentary parties at 11:00am to find a common ground to end the House obstruction. But it was postponed till 1:00pm after he could not convince everyone.