The extended tenure of the two transitional justice mechanisms will expire on February 10.

Their tenure was extended for a year on February 10 this year. The and Reconciliation Commission (TRC) and the Commission of Investigation on Enforced Disappeared Persons (CIEDP) formed in 2015, almost nine years after the peace deal that ended the decade-long Maoist insurgency.

In the last three years, the two commissions have received around 63,000 complaints about human rights violations committed during the insurgency both by the state actors and Maoist rebels. There have been no substantial achievements when it comes to investigation into the complaints in the last three years, and their tenure has to be extended once again to address the concerns of the conflict victims.

But to extend their term, the Act that regulates the commissions has to be amended. With only a little more than three months remaining for their term to expire, there are concerns about further delay in justice to thousands of conflict victims.

 The commissions were granted one-year extension in February based on the Act regulating them which though said the commissions’ term would be of two years, their tenure could be extended by one year. “Our Act doesn’t allow another term extension,” said Lila Udasi a member of the TRC.

For another term extension, the government needs to draft a bill seeking to amend the Act, which then needs to be approved by Parliament, which is likely to be place in February after the federal elections on November 26 and December 7.

Udasi told the Post that the commission is trying to investigation into around 1,000 complaints in about a month. The TRC alone has received around 60,000 complaints.

Both the commissions have been hamstrung by budget and resource crunch, while the government has failed to formulate legislations in line with the international standards as per an order of the Supreme Court.

The Supreme Court’s January 2015 orders striking down around a dozen provisions have been ignored so far, much to the chagrin of conflict victims and rights defenders.

The court had ordered to criminalise torture and disappearances and remove the statute of limitation for registering conflict-era cases. The court had also ruled out amnesties for perpetrators of grave human rights violation.

More than 16,000 people were killed and thousands were displaced during the 1996-2006 Maoist insurgency.