With the formation of a constitutional organ to determine the number and sizes of local bodies in the country, the government has halted its plan to add new municipalities.

The Ministry of Federal Affairs and Local Development (MoFALD) had tabled a proposal at the Cabinet to add 34 new municipalities, but the Cabinet has rejected the proposal.

According to Joint Secretary Gopi Krishna Khanal, chief of Municipality and Environment Management Division at MoFALD, all the proposed areas had fulfilled the criteria to become municipality, but the government decided that the Local Body Restructuring Commission formed last month will look into the matter. The government had formed the Local Body Restructuring Commission on March 14 under the leadership of former secretary Balananda Paudel, as per the constitutional provision for formation of a mechanism to determine the number and boundaries of Village and Municipal Councils in the country after the adoption of federalism. Article 295 of the constitution states that the tenure of the commission will be of one year.

According to Article 56 of the constitution, the state will be restructured into three levels—federal, provincial and local. At the local level, the constitution outlines Village Councils, Municipal Councils and District Assemblies which will replace the existing Village Development Committees, municipalities and District Development Committees, respectively.

As the country has opted for a federal administrative model, restructuring of the state, including local bodies, is one of the major tasks.

The government has come under constant criticism for its plans to haphazardly add municipalities in the country without proper planning.

According to fiscal decentralisation expert Khim Lal Devkota, more than 70 percent of local bodies in the country are not financially secure and have to rely on grants for even covering their administrative expenses. Devkota said that instead of increasing the number of local bodies, they have to be brought down for their efficient management.

After a hiatus of 18 years, the government in May 2014 had created 72 new municipalities. Again in December same year, 61 municipalities were added. Last year the government declared 26 new municipalities, taking the total number to 217. Altogether, there are one metropolitan city, 12 sub-metropolitan cities, 204 municipalities and 3,157 VDCs in the country.

An administrative area is declared a municipality in the Tarai if it has a population of 20,000 and a minimum annual income of Rs5 million, along with other development criteria. For the hills and mountains, the required population is 10,000 and minimum annual income Rs500,000.

MoFALD, in January, had asked all District Development Committees in the country to propose the names of existing VDCs which could be merged to get municipality status. In total, it received 47 such proposals and found 34 of them to be eligible.

“It is unlikely that these will become municipalities soon,” Khanal conceded.

“The government decided that it was not the right time technically..”