Kathmandu, March 30

Advocate General of Province 2 Diepndra Jha said the provincial government was unable to deliver services to the people due to lack of legal framework, resources and power.

Talking to THT he said the federal government had not handed over the administration of some offices to the provinces, thereby affecting service delivery.

“Province 2 chief minister is not in a position to issue orders to the district administration offices and district police offices,” he said.

As per the constitution, agriculture, education and forest sector should come under the jurisdiction of the provincial government, but as of today, these things have not been transferred to the provincial government, he argued.

“At present the government can only levy agriculture tax. It is not clear how much tax the province and the local governments could levy on matters of concurrent lists,” he said and added that the provincial government was unable to deliver services to the people due to shortcomings of federal government which should have allocated resources and prepared infrastructure needed for the provinces in advance.

Jha said that the constitution stipulated that the provincial governments could receive foreign loan and grant with the consent of the government, but the Inter-government Finance Act stipulated that the provincial government should get federal government’s consent before receiving foreign loan and grants.

“Excise duty and value added tax are the two major sources of income for the provincial government, but the relevant laws say that 70 per cent of these tax will go to federal government’s coffer, 15 per cent to provincial government and 15 per cent to local governments,” he added.

Provincial governments should get 30 per cent of excise duty and VAT if they have to better manage their expenses, Jha argued.

“Federal government has not formed the Natural Resources and Finance Commission and the provincial governments do not know how much they will get from the federal government,” he said and added that if the provincial governments were not given adequate revenue, they would always have to depend on the federal government which would be bad for federal set-up.

Jha said the provincial government needed to pass laws to recruit civil servants but the relevant law states that the Public Service Commission would provide criteria for the same which the PSC had not done yet.

“Province 2 government has not been able to give business to the provincial assembly because it lacks expertise to draft laws. Federal government has not provided any framework law yet,” he said and added that the provincial government did not want to take a risk of enacting law that could contradict federal laws or the constitution.