Kathmandu, April 7 The Ministry of Culture, Tourism and Civil Aviation (MoCTCA) has halted the budget of all the authorities, departments, boards, committees and commissions working under its supervision. As per the direction of the Ministry of Finance, MoCTCA has halted the budget that was allocated under 14 different titles for the respective bodies working under the tourism ministry. As per Gopi Chandra Bhandari, deputy secretary at MoCTCA, the Finance Ministry had sent a letter to MoCTCA on April 2 to halt the budget. “Following the directive from the Finance Ministry, MoCTCA has decided to halt the budget of Department of Tourism, Department of Archaeology, Language Commission and Narayanhiti Durbar Square, among other bodies,” he said. “The MoCTCA will not be responsible for the expenditure made by these bodies after April 2.” According to Bhandari, the budget allocated under the titles of services and advice expenditure, staff training, seminars and workshops, event expenditure, other administrative events expenditure and monitoring and evaluation expenses have been halted. However, MoCTCA has mentioned that the budget can be used for needful monitoring purposes. Similarly, other titles for which MoCTCA has halted the budget are casual expenses that come under the current expenditure of respective bodies, vehicle services, machinery, furniture, computer software maintenance and procurement, research activities, land acquisition and other casual activities. “The budget for all the works except those that are very essential has been halted until further notice,” he said, adding, “The concerned authorities will have to justify budget mobilisation if any emergency does occur.” A version of this article appears in e-paper on April 08, 2020 of The Himalayan Times.