There are 75 District Development Committees, 3,915 Village Development Committees and 58 municipalities in the country.

"We will continue to shut down all the local body offices if the government does not address our demands," said Hari Kumar Shrestha, president, Local Body Employees' Union Nepal (LBEUN). "We will also gherao the Singha Durbar and the Ministry of Local Development," he said. "We will publicise the protest schedule tomorrow."

About 35,000 staffers, including 7,000 temporary ones, are employed in the local bodies, according to the LBEUN. "We want facilities akin to those provided by the Civil Service Act," said Shrestha. "Our demand also includes managing the messy local bodies."

People receive services such as vital registration, recommendations and development activities through the local bodies.

In the absence of elected representatives at the local governance units, the employees are carrying out all the activities there, for most of the last eight years.

The LBEUN has been agitating for the last two years. "We want a Local Service Act," said Shrestha, lamenting that they were discriminated.

According to the Ministry of Local Development, a proposal to amend the regulation concerned, addressing most demands of the agitators, was tabled in the Cabinet three months ago. The government is yet to take any action on it. "We internally discussed the issue yesterday," said Dinesh Kumar Thapaliya. "All the demands are not reasonable in the present context."

Thapaliya said they have analysed the proposed federal modality, financial burden and facts and figures relating to the local body employees. "It is the government's responsibility, not that of the ministry," he clarified.

Agitating staffers, however, expressed their ignorance about the discussion.