The parliamentary special committee formed to investigate the embezzlement of funds in various cooperatives needs to study the financial transactions of around three dozen organisations in detail.

Going through their balance sheets and transactions and finding if their lending was legal is a must to understand their reality. Only the experts in accounting and auditing can study the matter minutely. However, neither the lawmakers in the special committee nor the staff from the parliament secretariat assisting them have sound knowledge of the matter. Most of them come from a legal background. And the secretariat doesn’t have adequate funds to hire chartered accountants.

“We are capable of making policy recommendations, but we need experts to study the financial transactions,” said an official in the committee. “But we are not in a position to hire independent experts immediately without enough funds.”

The committee on June 26 directed nine cooperatives to produce their financial documents. It sought the documents from the Yamuna Multipurpose Cooperative, the Image Savings and Credit Cooperative, the Sahara Savings and Credit Cooperative, the Samanata Savings and Credit Cooperative, the Sano Paila Savings and Credit Cooperative, the Supreme Savings and Credit Cooperative, the Surya Darshan Savings and Credit Cooperative, the Sumeru Savings and Credit Cooperative and the Swarna Laxmi Savings and Credit Cooperative.

These cooperatives allegedly transferred money to the Gorkha Media Network, which operated the now-shuttered Galaxy 4K television once managed by Rabi Lamichhane, the deputy prime minister and home minister in the coalition government, and to other companies and organisations.

Similarly, a meeting of the committee on Sunday decided to seek the documents from 20 different cooperatives declared crisis-ridden by the government. It also held meetings with the chairpersons of committees formed in different periods of time to study the problems of cooperatives. Numraj Khanal, secretary of the committee, said consultations continue.

“Actual investigation will start once we receive the documents from all the cooperatives,” he said. Agreeing that they lack experts to study the documents thoroughly, he said, “I don’t think it is possible to hire experts immediately. We are thinking of requesting the Nepal Rastra Bank for support, but no decision to this effect has been taken.” The committee’s next meeting is scheduled for Tuesday.

Ishwari Neupane, a member of the study committee led by CPN-UML’s Surya Thapa, said they hope to start getting the documents this week. “If not, we will have to write again,” she said.

After weeks of negotiations between the ruling and opposition parties, a seven-member committee was constituted on May 28 to investigate the embezzlement of deposits in dozens of cooperatives in the country. The committee, which has three months to study the issue and prepare a report, has spent a month without starting a detailed investigation.

As per its terms of reference, the committee will investigate cooperatives facing crisis, their legal and institutional purposes, financial systems, regulations, supervision, and transparency, and make recommendations to the government.

Another task is to recommend measures for the immediate return of savings to the depositors of the crisis-ridden cooperatives identified by the Department of Cooperatives and the Crisis-ridden Cooperatives Management Committee. The parliamentary panel has also been mandated to study and analyse the progress of the savings protection and return by the crisis-ridden cooperatives.

The government has so far listed 21 cooperatives as crisis-ridden, with billions of depositors’ money at risk. According to the Crisis-ridden Cooperatives Management Committee, a total of 59,587 depositors have claimed that the 21 cooperatives have embezzled over Rs36.289 billion of public deposits. Scores of other cooperatives across the country are in trouble but they are yet to be officially declared crisis-ridden.

Another task the Thapa-led committee needs to accomplish is tracking the condition of funds from problem cooperatives. The funds include those allegedly transferred to the Gorkha Media Network and other companies and organisations.

It will also investigate the legality of such transfers, investigate anyone involved in such illegal transfer of funds, and make recommendations to recover the funds.

According to police investigations, billions of rupees from several cooperatives were transferred to the GB Rai-led Gorkha Media Network that operated the Galaxy 4K television. Rai has fled the country, and Interpol has issued a diffusion notice against him. Rai and Lamichhane co-founded and jointly managed the media company.

It took weeks for the parties to agree on the jurisdiction of the committee as they were sharply divided on whether to name Lamichhane, who has been accused of illegally channelling money from three cooperatives to the media company he jointly led with Rai. The Congress agreed not to name Lamichhane after an agreement to probe all the cooperatives linked to the Gorkha Media Network.