The government’s controversial land bill, officially titled the ‘Bill to amend some Nepal acts related to land, 2025’, was removed from the House of Representatives’ agenda on Wednesday after strong objections from major political parties, including the ruling Nepali Congress.
Despite being listed as a tentative agenda item, the bill faced resistance over concerns of its potential misuse and lack of adequate consultation.
The tentative agenda for Wednesday’s meeting of the House of Representatives included a proposal by Balram Adhikari, minister for Land Management, Cooperatives and Poverty Alleviation, to initiate a clause-wise discussion on the land bill in the House.
However, the bill was removed from the agenda after senior Congress leaders objected to it.
Congress General Secretary Bishwa Prakash Sharma objected to the bill, stating that it required amending and building consensus before it is presented for deliberation.
He also disagreed over the government’s intent to table the bill directly in the House plenary without adequate groundwork.
Before any subject is included in the House agenda, it is first discussed in the parliament’s Business Advisory Committee, where chief whips from the parties represented in the parliament hold discussions regarding the agenda items of the next meeting.
Agenda items for any House meeting are finalised based on the understanding reached in the meeting.
But when the party had already raised objections and even registered an amendment proposal regarding the land bill, why didn’t Congress Chief Whip Shyam Ghimire voice any objection in the Business Advisory Committee when the issue was being advanced as part of the parliamentary agenda?
“During the Business Advisory Committee meeting, I did remind the members about the amendment proposals submitted by our party leaders,” Ghimire told the Post.
According to him, Minister for Land Management, Cooperatives, and Poverty Alleviation Adhikari assured them that he would consult with the party before the bill is formally presented in the House meeting.
“Based on that assurance, I agreed to include the bill in the House’s agenda,” Adhikari said. “Later, when it became clear that broader discussions with other parties were still necessary, the bill was withdrawn from the tentative agenda.”
Ghimire said there was no misunderstanding within the party regarding including the bill in the tentative agenda of the House on Wednesday.
However, Sanjay Gautam, a Congress lawmaker who submitted an amendment to the bill, stated that the matter should have been halted within the Business Advisory Committee itself.
Gautam argued that since the party’s chief whip was aware that party’s lawmakers had submitted amendment proposals, and given that it was not an appropriate time to push forward such a sensitive bill without amending it, the issue should have been withheld from being included in the parliamentary agenda at the committee level.
“We have made both the party and the chief whip aware of this matter,” Gautam told the Post. “We hope such mistakes will not be repeated in the future.”
Congress General Secretaries Gagan Thapa and Sharma registered amendments to the land-related bill on May 23 to prevent potential misuse by land mafias exploiting legal loopholes after the government registered the bill in federal parliament on May 6.
Thapa and Sharma, along with a few other Congress lawmakers, proposed a seven-point amendment that referred to previous misuse of land exceeding legal limits under names like Patanjali Yogpeeth and Giri Bandhu Tea Estate and emphasised that such actions should not be repeated.
Congress lawmaker Gautam explained that the current bill is ambiguous and must be clarified to ensure that land approved for specific purposes cannot be misused for real estate business.
Congress lawmakers have proposed amending Clause 12(g) of the Land Act and adding Clause 12(h), which prohibits land granted for agricultural, industrial, educational, or health purposes from being used for other uses such as housing or real estate development, including apartments and housing plots.
The constitutional bench, headed by then Chief Justice Bishowambar Prasad Shrestha, ruled that Oli’s Cabinet decision contravened Section 12 (C) of the Land Act 1964 and was immature, with the full text of the verdict realeased on May 12 last year.
The new bill simplifies transferring ownership and issuing land ownership certificates to landless Dalits, squatters, and unmanaged settlers.
However, Thapa and Sharma warned that without clear legal provisions, such relaxed rules could be exploited. They suggested removing the term “unmanaged settlers” from Clause 52(B) of the principal Act, arguing that vague classifications could lead to abuse.
Furthermore, they demanded amendments to the National Parks and Wildlife Conservation Act 1973, citing that lands shown as forest or shrubland on maps inhabited by landless people could be misused under the current proposal to re-map and reclassify these lands in favour of land distribution.
Congress leader Gautam further explained that land ownership should be granted only after considering the recipient’s financial condition, land type, area, valuation, settlement duration, and whether they already own property in urban areas.
The government introduced similar provisions through ordinances in January, but these lapsed after failing to gain support in the National Assembly. The same provisions were reintroduced as a bill in Parliament on May 6.
Along with the Congress lawmakers, the Janata Samajbadi Party Nepal (JSP-Nepal), led by Upendra Yadav, also submitted a 13-point amendment proposal on the land bill on May 20, two weeks after the bill was registered in Parliament.
Due to JSP-Nepal’s opposition to the land-related ordinance in the National Assembly, it was abandoned when both Houses passed four other ordinances.
In addition to the Congress and JSP-Nepal, the Rastriya Swatantra Party had also submitted an amendment proposal to the land bill. Altogether, around 55 members of Parliament from both the ruling and opposition parties have registered amendment proposals concerning the bill.
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