About four months ago, a 31-year-old woman from Dhakari Rural Municipality in Achham registered a complaint at the judicial committee seeking separation from her husband. The woman sought legal support from the committee, claiming that her husband completely ignored her and did not give time to family, among other family issues.

The constitution envisages the provision of judicial committees in each of the 753 local units in the country with the objective to ensure that justice is delivered.

The Local Government Operation Act 2074 BS clarifies the functions and duties of the local judicial committee. The judicial committee has been empowered to settle disputes related to 13 specific matters including property boundary disputes; disputes regarding canals, dams, ditches or allocation of water; encroachment on roads or way out; disputes about compensation for damage to crops; disputes about payment of wages; and disputes about lost and found cattle.

The judicial committee in Dhakari Rural Municipality headed by the deputy mayor or vice-chairman has not been able to take a decision due to several problems with the lack of infrastructure and lack of legal knowledge among the people’s representatives.

The judicial committee called both the woman and her husband to the office of vice-chairperson for discussion since the judicial committee does not have a separate room to discuss cases.

Netrakala Shahi, the vice-chairperson, says it was a difficult intervention with the couple because they could not discuss sensitive matters at the office, which was crowded with other service seekers and staff.

“The rural municipality does not have a separate room for a judicial committee,” Shahi said. “We need to have a safe room wherein the complainant can discuss his/her issues without compromising their secrecy. The husband and wife were not ready to discuss their family and public issues publicly. So we couldn’t make a decision.”

The rural municipality office is under construction and currently, it does not even have a separate room for the vice-chairperson. “How can we work effectively since we don’t even have a separate office room?” she said. “We are currently operating out of the old office building and there is not enough space to accommodate my office, let alone a separate room for the judicial committee.”

According to Shahi, a good number of local people have been approaching the judicial committee in recent days but the committee has not been able to do its work effectively due to a lack of physical infrastructure and human resources.

“We have to admit that the judicial committee is not working effectively,” Shahi said. “Not only the disputants but the members of the judicial committee also feel insecure while working on judicial committee cases.”

There are 10 local units in Achham, a hill district of Sudurpaschim Province. Only Mangalsen Municipality, Sanphebagar Municipality and Mellekh Rural Municipality have their own office buildings. Seven other local units of Achham have been operating from the congested rented buildings so they haven’t been able to manage a separate trail room to maintain secrecy.

Lack of legal knowledge among the people’s representatives is another hurdle faced by the judicial committee. Since most deputy mayors or vice-chairpersons do not come from legal studies backgrounds, the committee can hire advocates to facilitate the legal process in the judicial committee. But none of the local units in Achham has appointed a legal officer to make the functions of the judicial committee effective.

“Neither do the members of the judicial committee have legal knowledge nor the committee has legal officers,” said Saru Devi Khadka, the vice-chairperson of Chaurpati Rural Municipality. “So we face problems to settle even minor disputes. I am not a well-educated person. I have to face further difficulties to carry out the judicial committee’s work.”