Kathmandu, March 29

The government is preparing to register a bill related to the structure and management of the newly created local levels.

The bill, now under consideration of the statutory committee of the Cabinet, has proposed to allow local levels to create posts of the employees they would need to run the daily affairs of the administration.

The proposed Provincial Service Commission will select their staff. “Until the formation of PSC, the local body can recruit necessary staff on contract basis,” said Secretary at the Ministry of Federal Affairs and Local Development Kedar Bahadur Adhikari. He also said that the government will send two things — a model of organisational structure and staff that the local levels need for the time being.

The bill has also provisioned the procedure for exercising the rights given by the constitution. According to the schedule of the constitution, a local level can formulate its law without contradicting federal and provincial laws.

It can also impose tax as provisioned by the constitution and determine the range of taxation. The constitution has also given the right to manage secondary level education and primary health care services. The bill also proposes that local levels can collect transportation tax.

In the past, the local bodies were allowed to claim only two per cent of this tax. The bill also intends to give power to the local levels to impose house rent tax and household tax.

Local levels will have to share the tourism tax with federal and provincial governments.

An officer at the ministry told THT on condition of anonymity that the ministry has made a primary estimation of six billion rupees for the initial administrative management of 481 rural municipalities.