Chandranigahapur, July 16:

Ninety-six Village Development Committee offices of Rautahat district are without secretaries. People of the 96 VDCs have been facing problems due to the absence of secretaries. They blamed the District Administration Office for not bothering to address their problems.

Citing threats from the armed groups, the VDC secretaries have been staying in district headquarters Gaur and Chandranigahapur.

As VDC secretaries have moved out of their work area, locals have been facing problems while making citizenship certificates, recommendation letters, registration of birth, death, marriages and migration.

Villagers complained that they were compelled to visit district headquarters and Chandranigahapur to get their job done.

School teacher Murari Giri of Kanakpur VDC said VDC secretary Kamal Timilsina and assistant secretary Ekaramul Muslim had not reported to the office for five months. Giri said he could not get a recommendation letter despite frequent visits to Chandranigahapur.

Assistant secretary Muslim said his presence in the VDC was meaningless, as all official documents were with VDC secretary Timilsina.

VDC secretaries said they had been living outside their work area due to prevailing insecurity. CDO of Rautahat district Shiva Prasad Nepal said he did not know how many secretaries had moved out of their VDCs. Nepal admitted that he could not address this problem, as he was new to the district. Rautahat Superintendent of Police Ramesh Thapa said there were enough police posts and that the police were committed to providing security to government employees.