The criteria for restructuring local bodies (LBs) are being hotly debated of late. As per the Local Body Restructuring Commission’s standards, minimum population sizes of 15,000, 25,000 and 50,000 are required to form a Gaon Palika in the mountain, hill and Tarai regions respectively. Similarly, the minimum population sizes required to form a municipality are 20,000, 35,000 and 75,000 in the three regions respectively. A municipality which is also the district headquarters in the hills is required to have at least 45,000 people while the minimum population size for a district headquarters in the Tarai and Inner Tarai is 95,000. According to the information released by the commission, there will be no more than 565 local governments (LGs) in the country. Leaders of major political parties and Members of Parliament (MPs) have strongly opposed the criteria set by the commission.

A breakdown of the 565 proposed local units into geographical regions shows that there will be 100, 277 and 188 LGs in the mountains, hills and Tarai respectively. The data show that the commission has reduced the number of LBs in the three geographical regions proportionately, fully ignoring the remoteness and geographical complexities of the country. It is very difficult for people in the mountains to gain access to education, health care, drinking water, agricultural and livestock services and banking. In the Tarai, 80 percent of the residents can obtain government services within 30 minutes while the figure in the mountains is only 20 percent. Therefore, the commission’s one-size-fits-all approach is impractical and unscientific. This will not help to bring government services to people’s doorsteps in accordance with the spirit of federalism.

Unprecedented practice

It is a universally accepted phenomenon that the number of local units is automatically reduced when the level of human development, socio-economic infrastructure and awareness increases and villages develop into municipalities. Since the level of human development, socio-economic progress and infrastructure in rural regions of Nepal is low, obviously there will be a greater number of new local units. For instance, as the proposed Province 2 is very weak in terms of all development indicators, there should be more LGs here. The proposed criteria are not practical for the Tarai districts either. For instance, Siraha has a higher population than Chitwan which is also more developed, but the commission has proposed establishing the same number of local governments in the two districts. It is really unsuitable in our context to fix population size as the basis for forming local units. There is no such practice in any part of the world.

The commission has proposed forming different local units in a very unscientific and impractical manner. The number of LGs in Bhaktapur and Mugu districts are identical even though Mugu is highly remote and the poorest district in the country. Similarly, the number of LGs proposed for Banke and Kailali is double the number planned for Humla and Doti, which is entirely unrealistic. The commission has also set the minimum criteria for allocating three, four and five new local units in the mountain, hill and Tarai regions respectively, which is impractical. Instead of focusing on population, which is against the spirit of federalism, the commission should take population density, geography and its complexities and socio-economic and human development while proposing the number of new local units.

US, Brazil, India and Switzerland

The population sizes of the 19,492 municipal governments in the US range from very large (more than 300,000) to very small (less than1,000). Lazy Lake Municipality in Florida has a population of 24 while New York City contains 8,000,000 people. More than over 90 percent of the municipal governments in the US have a population size of less than 25,000. The number of municipal governments and their distribution by population size also varies by state. Brazil, another federal country, has given relatively more powers to LGs. They provide a large range of public services such as health, education, drinking water and so on. There are 5,663 municipalities in Brazil, and they vary widely in population size from Serra Nova Dourada with 562 residents to Sao Paulo with 11.9 million residents.

In India, Mumbai and Delhi municipalities have populations of 12.4million and 11.0 million respectively while Kapurthala Municipality in the state of Punjab has a population of only 98,000. Similarly, there are more than 20 million Gram Panchayats with many having less than 1,000 residents each. Switzerland has dozens of municipalities with a population of less than 500 each. While Werdenbery City comprises only 90 people, Zurich City contains 0.4 million. Thus, it is illogical and paradoxical to fix a minimum population of 15,000 for a local government unit in the mountain region of a least developed country like ours.

Capability and identity

The present controversy would not have surfaced if the commission had fixed the number of district-wise LGs as per the weight of different factors. In light of this, let us analyse the proposed 565 local units against the criteria it has proposed: rural population (based on 3,915 VDCs), population density, geographical area, VDC number, remoteness and infrastructure development. As per the given criteria, 30 percent weight has been given to rural population, 15 percent each to population and area, and 20 percent each to others.

Accordingly, four local units (lowest) each have been proposed in Bhaktapur, Manang, Rasuwa and Terhathum while 12 (highest) each have been proposed in Saptari, Dhanusha and Sarlahi. Based on this, there will be 11 local units each in Morang and Rupandehi compared to the 13 each planned by the commission. Accordingly, there will be a slight increase in the number of districts that are socio-economically weak and poor in infrastructural development. Moreover, the proposed 76 units for Province 2 will increase to 80.

There will be seven and four units more in Karnali and the far-western hill districts respectively compared to that proposed by the commission. Likewise, Jajarkot, Rukumand 11 Tarai districts can benefit from this model. This approach is based on an established principle which has made capability and identity as the main bases. Once the number of districts is finalised, the same criteria such as revenue, population, geography, level of infrastructure development, local caste/ethnicity clusters and local languages can be used to determine metropolitan cities, sub-metropolitan cities, municipalities, Gaon Palikas and autonomous, special and protected areas.

All will agree that there should be fewer local government units, but it should not create more hurdles or limit the goods and services that citizens have been receiving from the government. Instead, the new structure should promote accessibility. If this does not happen, the restructuring of LBs will not be justified. It should be noted that we still have enough time to do this in a better way. We must all be vigilant to prevent any conspiracy where the existing LBs structures will be dismantled and the new structures recommended by the commission cannot be implemented.

Devkota holds a PhD in fiscal decentralisation and is a former member of the Local Bodies Fiscal Commission