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Wednesday, November 22, 2006
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Role of Judiciary in Dispensation of Justice
-Prof. Dr. Bharat B. Karki, Head of the Law Department, Faculty of Law, T.U
In exercise to its constitutional, legal and rational authority following three types of roles: ordinary, reactive, assertive and expected, the Nepalese judiciary found to have played in the process dispensing justice:
Ordinary role: Mostly the courts are engaged in playing a normal, rhetoric and litigation role in delivering win-win, win-loose or loose-loose civil and criminal justice. Normally at the given parameter the regular judicial and administrative functions are imparted by the courts. A decade old Maoist conflict situation, have laid negative-positive impact on the courts. By negative impact we mean a parralism created by People's courts leading in state courts to be as half-courts, while positive impact bore a fear psyeosis from wrong-doing, injustice or corrupting.
Reactive Role: Some times the courts have not played the required independent and impartial role depending on the nature and issue of a particular case. Partisan, biased, negative and comfort approaches of the judges have seldom jeopardized the spirit of justice dispensation, as a result injustice prevails over the prayer for justice. During the whole of the Panchayat regime mostly the judges favored Royal autocracy and linked to be called as Royalists counteracting the undercurrent democratic movement as they did partly to the last year's Royal autocracy. Aftermath of 1990 despite their strong constitutional status mostly judges showed their political bias and divisive majority-minority ruling, for an instance the House Dissolution case decisions of the Supreme Court remained very controversial, as a matter of fact of which decline of democracy started with the political parties becoming weaker and the palace and regressive forces getting stronger to take over power by 2001.
The other disputed decisions on different issues are Annapurna Rana Case (1998) laying down sexual consummation and marriage as two different things; Surya Tobacco Case (1997), where competence of the court is questioned; Khobari Roy Case, where an arrested criminal parliamentarian was released by habeas corpus writ; Dhamija Scandal (Supreme courts refusal in issuing an ordering its investigation; Ardali Case (1998) ( facility of personal assistance of judges upheld). he recent controversial decision of the Supreme Court lifting the black-listing tag of the defaults not paying billions rupees of bank debt has created serious public sensation and resentment against the decision. Public Accounts Committee of the reinstalled House of Representatives has organized public discussion on the subject-matter of judgment, and has strongly objected the allegation made by jurist community as interference on judiciary as unfortunate and irresponsibility towards public justice.
The ordinary courts (District Courts, Courts of Appeal and the Supreme Court) have jurisdiction to hear and decide corruption cases and execute decisions coming through litigational process. It is an irony that CIAA files corruption cases before the special court, whereas Judicial Council files such a case against an Appellate Court or District Court judge before the Appellate Court. In pursuance to the constitutional provisions, the Administration of Justice Act, 1991 and the Supreme Court Act, 1991, Special Court Act, 2002 and other relevant laws, the Supreme Court is mandated to lead the courts and other quasi-judicial bodies in counteracting corruption while dispensing justice, but in practice this court is charged to be a court of acquittal particularly in the corruption cases of senior officials. The latest decision of the Supreme Court in acquitting the ministers appointed by the King illegally during his autocracy in 2005, the ex-ministers were charged in corruption cases years ago, but the judgment was declared during the last months of King's rule (in April 2006) has been very controversial. The Supreme Court gave clean chits to former ministers Padma Sundar Lawati, Dan Bahadr Shahi and former assistant minister Sinet Shrestha in a corruption case citing precedents on cases of CIAA v D. B. Lama, and CIAA v Lokman Singh Karki that CIAA had no authority to appeal under the previous Act. Since the judicial trend in corruption cases is unpredictable and mostly pro-accused. One can plainly think that the Supreme Court takes corruption very lightly, easily and liberally it is because the existing laws are not so strong enough to deal with such tendency of the court.
On the other hand, Nepalese judiciary is considered the top fourth most corrupt institution of the country. Peoples' faith in judiciary is seemingly not strong. Media, civil society and individuals are scared of talking openly about corruption in the judiciary because of the sword of contempt of court always hanging over their heads. Judiciary has absolute discretion to interpret contempt of court safeguard on its own way. Because contempt of court has neither been defined by law nor any specific procedure has yet been laid down by law in this regard. Therefore a comprehensive statute on contempt of court has become very necessary. It is obvious that the very intent of contempt of court is to safeguard the integrity, independence and command respect of the judiciary. But never the altar of contempt of court be misused to protect a corrupt judge or judicial servant. Because corruption in judiciary is the highest form of corruption as it paves overriding affect on the whole social fabric and in the future of a nation, by damning the ideals of justice it damages democracy the most. Bribing court officials is considered the major form of corruption prevalent in the judiciary, in which the court employees and public prosecutors are cited as the main facilitators of corruption. In some cases bribe was directly taken by the judges themselves. Therefore cost of corruption in judiciary is found very high in Nepal . Lack of accountability and vast discretionary powers of the judiciary are considered the major causes of corruption scenario in Nepal .
As chief justice and other justices of the Supreme Court can be prosecuted in a corruption charge only after the completion of impeachment proceeding in the House of Representatives provided that impeachment was made on the ground of corruption. Impeaching a sitting justice of the Supreme Court is not an easy task; history shows that not a single motion of impeachment has ever been moved in Nepal . There were some media reports for moving motion for impeachment against some judges for corruption, but it was surprising that the incumbent was later found elevated to the post of chief justice. Three justices of the Supreme Court were compelled to quit their posts after heavy media and civil society shelling. One can recall that those were the alleged ones in a 'sugar scandal' and a 'narcotic drug scandal'. Public Accounts Committee of the House of Representatives also had shown concern over a decision made by a Supreme Court justice of a particular bench for relaxing a Cigarette company from paying a substantial amount of tax to the government. These are the only few sensational revelation about some corrupt Judges, but not of the few glorified honest who have been captive of such judicial obstructionists. In case of lower courts some of the judges have resigned from their posts on the reported allegation of corruption.
The Judicial Council as a regular constitutional body established under Art. 93 of the 1990 Constitution is conferred with recommendatory powers among others on matters of appointment, taking disciplinary actions and dismissal of judges for reasons of incompetence, misconduct/ misbehavior or failure to discharge the duties of his office in good faith. It is expected to curb corruption in judiciary.
Besides, wide ranging powers conferred to the Judicial Council by law, experience shows that its functioning is far from satisfactory. There have been references of judicial indiscretion and impropriety committed by judges including Supreme Court judges, but the Judicial Council has hardly launched inquires into such allegation against Supreme Court judges barring a few instances. Nepal Bar Association deliberations, the Judges conferences admit that there is rampant corruption within the judiciary, they agree to get rid from it, but it is unlikely without the innovative and efficient role of the Judicial Council. Hence, the law need to be improved requiring Judicial Council to adopt a system of regular monitoring of judges conduct, publish its annual reports, and also devise a transparent and objective system of judicial appointments.
Assertive Role: The Supreme Court as the custodian of the Constitution and protector and promoter of the people's rights is expected to be assertive and active in discharging this role. In pursuance to Articles 23 and 88 of the Constitution of the 1990 the Supreme Court in exercise of these exclusive powers of judicial review has time and again played assertive role by testing constitutionality of legislative and administrative actions for enforcing fundamental rights guaranteed under Articles 11 to 22.
Dark Matter
Mystery in This Universe
Naba Raj Paudel, Physics Department IOE, Pulchowk
Peering deep and long into the darkness is what astronomers do. What they have found in recent years certainly inspires a sense of wonder, while attesting to major unseen features of the universe — dark stars, dark matter and dark energy. About four hundred years ago, the great astronomer, Johannes Kepler, realized that the very fact that the sky is dark at night was telling something profound about the nature of the universe. If the universe were infinite and uniformly populated with luminous stars, Kepler reasoned, and then any line of sight must eventually encounter the surface of a star. Therefore, no dark gaps should lie between the stars, and the sky should not be dark at night! Kepler’s solution was that the universe is finite rather than infinite. However, Einstein’s theory of gravity showed that a finite universe must be a curved one in which light does not escape, so Kepler’s solution did not work.
Absorption of distant light by interstellar gas will not work either, because the gas would eventually heat up and glow. Clustering the stars and galaxies with progressively larger gaps between them could work in principle, but this would violate observations of galaxies and cosmic background radiation which show that the universe is uniform on the largest scales. The solution, hinted at in an essay by Edgar Allen Poe a century and a half ago, is that stars do not live forever. Their lifetime is too short, and the time it takes for light to travel to Earth from the distant reaches is too long for starlight to fill the vast spaces with enough radiation to keep the sky from being dark at night. The expansion of the universe helps also.
Since Newton explained gravity, astronomers have speculated that some stars might have collapsed and become dark, that their gravity might be so strong that nothing, not even light could escape. These dark stars are called black holes and in the last thirty years astronomers have amassed an impressive body of evidence for the existence of two types of black holes. Stellar- mass black holes are presumably the collapsed remnants of stars at least 20 times more massive than the Sun. The best stellar black hole candidates discovered so far are in a close orbit around a normal star and are pulling it apart. As matter from the normal star falls toward the black hole, it emits observable X-radiation before it disappears into the black hole, never to return. The numbers of these fearsome gravitational goblins in our Milky Way galaxy are estimated to range from tens of millions to hundreds of millions altogether.
Radio, infrared, optical and X-ray studies show that a much larger type of black hole, called a super massive black hole exists at the center of most galaxies. These black holes have masses ranging from a few million to a few billion times the mass of the Sun. The super massive black hole at the center of Milky Way galaxy is a featherweight, with a mass of only about 3 million solar masses. How super massive black holes are formed is not understood. They could have formed through the direct collapse of a cloud of matter at the center of a galaxy, or through the merger of black holes, or by the gradual accretion of gas from the surrounding galaxy, or by a combination of all of the above. Their growth could depend on the availability of surrounding gas, or nearby black holes that could be captured, or the rate of rotation of the host galaxy.
One important clue that has been discovered in the past few years is that the mass of a galaxy’s central super massive black hole is roughly related to the mass of the central bulge of the galaxy. For example, the Milky Way Galaxy has a relatively small bulge, and a smaller super massive black hole. Any successful theory of the formation of super massive black holes will have to account for the black hole/bulge relationship.
Results from the astronomical analysis have raised the possibility that yet another type of black hole may exist. These black holes, whose masses could be in the range of se hundred to several thousand solar masses, are called intermediate-mass black holes. They could be the remains of extremely massive stars thought to have formed early the evolution of the universe or they could have formed ±r the rapid merger of many smaller black holes in the of dense star clusters or they may be unusually s black holes. The evidence is not strong enough at this point to know.
Dark Matter
Stellar, super massive, and possibly intermediate mass black holes are examples of a ghostly type of matter called dark matter. Simply put, dark matter is matter that cannot be seen with any type of telescope, but it can be detected through its gravitational effects. These effects are observed as peculiarities in the orbits of stars and gas in galaxies and galaxy clusters. Astronomers have come to the humbling conclusion that most of the matter in the universe, approximately 80 percent, is in the form of dark matter. Humbling because they do not know what it is.
The two known types of dark matter, massive neutrinos and black holes, are thought to be a minor portion of the overall dark matter budget. Through observational study of galaxies and galaxy clusters, and theoretical studies of how to form these structures, astrophysicists can determine the broad outlines of what dark matter must be like. The candidate that best reproduces the observed universe is a general class of dark matter called “cold dark matter” - hypothetical subatomic particles left over from the dense early universe. Cold dark matter gets its name from the assumption that these dark matter particles were moving slowly when galaxies and galaxy clusters began to form.
What could the cold dark matter be? One possibility suggested by superstring theory for elementary particles is the neutralino, which could have been produced in abundance in the first trillionth of a second of the Big Bang, and is predicted to have a mass about 100 times that of the proton. At the other end of the mass spectrum is the axion, which has- a mass much smaller than a proton or even an electron. Neither of these, nor any of the many other dark matter candidate particles, has ever been observed experimentally. But even the most elusive particle may leave a clue, and the ingenuity of astronomers and experimental physicists can be amazing, so someday soon, the nature of dark matter may come to light. However, solving the dark matter problem could be a piece of cake compared to achieving enlightenment on the nature of dark energy.
Dark Energy
In the past few years, astronomers have observed that the light from stars that exploded billions of years ago is inexplicably faint. The best explanation for this is that they are more distant than originally thought, which implies that the expansion of the universe must be accelerating. This astonishing result can be explained if the space between galaxies is filled with a mysterious dark energy. Although astrophysicists have no idea what dark energy is, they agree its nature is intimately connected with the nature of space itself Dark energy has the nightmarish property that, as the universe expands, it creates more dark energy. How much more is uncertain, but such repulsive behavior could eventually get badly out of hand The data still allow for the possibility that, several billion years from now, the ever- increasing dark energy could pull space apart so rapidly that galaxy clusters would scatter, followed by the disintegration of individual galaxies such as the Milky Way, then solar systems, until finally matter itself would be shredded by accelerating space.
Text courtesy: Science and Feature Vol No 8 2062-ed.
LUMBINI: Mecca for Buddhist pilgrims
- Rajeev Dangol, Nepal
At the time when the entire Nepalese tourism industry is facing a massive downturn, tourist inflow to Lumbini has l increased over the years. The five-year data provided by the Lumbini Development Trust (LDT) shows that Tourist inflow in Lumbini, which was steady until 2002 has rapidly grown to five figures in years ahead. In 2001 and 2002 just 10,135 and 9,036 tourists had visited Lumbini respectively. The figure further surged to 28,453 tourists in 2003, which is 100% increase compare to 2001 and 2002.
The major chunks of tourists visiting Lumbini were from Buddhist countries such as Sri Lanka (8,993), Thailand (5,134), North Korea (2,903) and Japan (2,264) in the year 2003. Furthermore in 2004 some 37,892 tourists visited Lumbini. In 2005, LDT recorded overwhelming 39,892 tourists, which was the three-fold increment than that of 2001.
The statistics clearly show that the number of tourist inflow in Lumbini is ever increasing. This year until September, some 37,001 tourists have already visited Lumbini and it is expected to reach 45,000 by the end of the year. All the above data are excluding Indian and domestic tourists. Similarly, domestic and Indian tourists are also increasing significantly every year. As per records, around 1,25, 000 Indian and domestic tourists visited Lumbini in 2004, which increased to 300,000 in 2005. This year the figure of Indian and domestic tourists is expected to reach 350,000.
The First World Buddhist Summit in 1998, Second World Buddhist Summit in 2004 and latest infrastructure developments in the Maya Devi Temple surroundings are believed to be key reasons for the increase in tourist arrivals. Similarly, the word of mouth promotion of Lumbini for its religious importance among Buddhists all over the world is another means of promotion. “The extensive promotion brought by Buddhist Summits and reconstruction of Maya Devi Temple have played major roles in boosting tourism of Lumbini.
Besides, easy accessibility (by air and land both) and tranquil environment for Buddhist pilgrims have further enhanced tourism in Lumbini,” informs Raju Bharati, Liaison Officer of LDT.
To develop Lumbini, the United Nations Development Program (UNDP) contributed nearly one million dollars for the preparation of a Master Plan including numerous engineering and its detail design works. The preparation of the Master Plan was entrusted to the Japanese architect Kenzo Tange and Urtec. The plan, which was completed in 1978, has as its objective to restore an area of three square miles, to be known as the Lumbini Garden, centering on the Ashoka Pillar, with an additional area of 25 square miles to be developed in its support.
According to the Kenzo Tange, the overall intent is to reinforce the symbolic entity of the Lumbini Garden in its simplicity and clarity. The Master Plan incorporates four aspects: History & Archeology, Religion & Culture, Social & Economic and Tourism. Development is aimed to provide facilities for the traditional visitors to Lumbini, pilgrims and tourists and will also support such complementary activities as residence by monks, researchers and international meetings.
Although execution of Lumbini Master Plan started from 1978 and was proposed to complete in 1985, and later in 1990, it however could not be achieved due to political as well as funding problems. “The timely political changes that took place in the country had a very negative impact on Development activities of Lumbini, depriving it from receiving smooth construction work due to change in board members time and again. The political interference has to be reduced in order to achieve smooth development works in Lumbini. It is sad to reveal that only the 35% of the total Master Plan constructions could be completed in 32 years of its execution,” woes Bharati.
The latest developments taking place in Lumbini site include construction of artificial ponds in the Maya Devi Temple
Vicinity, which is expected to complete by the end of this year. The modern amenity Bus Park is also being constructed as per the plan.
For the execution of Lumbini Master Plan, the government has been providing a fund of NRs 80 million every year to LDT. The fund was doubled from NRs 40 Million after it was felt insufficient (from 2004). Out of NRs 80 million budget, LDT utilizes NRs 20 million in administration expenses whereas remaining is used for infrastructure development, excavation and research works. In the LDT executive Board, there are 19 council members, out of which 9 Board members are chosen every five years.
Although, the term of LDT Board is for five years period, none of the board except for the one formed in 2001 completed its term. The LDT board got either reshuffled or completely changed with every change in ministerial cabinet in the country. The current LDT board was formed two months back, after democracy prevailed in the country. In the board, a position of Vice-Chairman of LDT is still lying empty and was offered to Dr. Harka Gurung who unfortunately passed away in a recent helicopter crash. Lately, the Nepal government has offered the vacant position to Karna Shakya.
The reports also show that there have been more than 50 per cent increase in tourists from land. In 2003, 39,869 tourists entered Nepal via Belahia Transit Point. Among them, 10,633 were from Sri Lanka. In 2002,46,147 tourists sub standard lodges in the Master Plan area. As the master plan doesn’t allow any private lodges and hotels to be built in any of its Monastic and Sacred Zone, private tourism infrastructures are speeding up outside the Master Plan area.
Although tourists have increased in Lumbini, entrepreneurs complain that they have not benefited from the growing number of Indian tourists. Indian tourists coming to Lumbini via land, return to India on the same day. “If it is to benefit from the Indian tourists coming to Lumbini from borders, the government must impose a mandatory one night stay for them.
At present, that particular crowd has only helped to litter the place," opines Dhruba Narayan Shrestha, President of Nepal Association of Tour & Travel Agents-NATTA. Except for the Indian and Nepalese nationals, LDT charges NRs 50 as an entrance fee from the other nationals. The entrance fee for Nepalese facilities and Indian nationals were recently suspended after one of the locals Bijay Kumar Baniya filed a petition in the court, asking for a free entrance for Indian and Nepalese nationals. Prior to this, LDT had been charging NRs 10 per person for both the nationals and it will remain suspended until a final hearing from the court.
At different times, LDT has been blamed of financial irregularities and its indifferent nature towards the benefit of locals in the area. “Though issues of financial irregularities in the trust are raised time and again, they are self made and totally baseless. Such accusations have only delayed our smooth operations,” clarifies the liaison officer.
Out of 42 plots in the Monastic Zone, 34 plots have already been handed over to the different countries. The plots were provided by LDT on the lease basis where the countries beholding rights for construction of monasteries have to pay US$ 100 to US$ 300 per year as a rent to LDT, depending on the plot size.
Being said that Lumbini is getting more recognition as a sacred pilgrimage for Buddhist religious tourists in the world, the number of Buddhist tourists visiting Lumbini is still meager, if compared to the large population of 2 billion Buddhist people all over the world. If we could make Lumbini a Mecca for Buddhists, the country would be devoid of tourists. NTB, LDT and the private sector should do more homework towards developing this concept in Buddhist countries.
Text courtesy: The NTTR October 2006 issue-ed.
Conflict and Governance Challenges
P. R. Ligal, Former Vice Chairman, National Planning Commission, Nepal
Improvements in governance have been evident in some countries, but there remain a number of governance challenges facing Asia and other conflict affected countries, prominent among these being the diversion of public resources for private ends. Much remains to be done to improve transparency and accountability in the formulation of public policy, in public-private relations, and in corresponding resource allocations.
In terms of the structures of government, there has been notable progress on decentralization and innovations in service delivery. The decentralization of both elected representation and of the public administration have recently been promoted in many Asian countries, but with mixed success. Local elections in countries such as China, India, Indonesia and Pakistan and Nepal have widened the scope for citizens to influence decision making, and increase resource allocations. Women have gained significant representation through affirmative action in local councils in these countries.
Increasing the responsibilities of local officials and elected representatives has raised questions in some contexts over the scope for elite capture and increased corruption, and almost everywhere over increased costs. Further, how far enhanced local representation translates into improved development outcomes has yet to be determined but there is some evidence of better targeted development spending on drinking water, fuel, and road construction in the Indian state of West Bengal.
Second, the capacity of governments to tax their population is an important indicator of the legitimacy and effectiveness of state institutions. The relatively low revenue/GDP ratio is a key challenge facing many Asian economies which need to raise resources for investing in infrastructure and improving social services.
Third, improved governance in the corporate sector remains challenging, especially where social and environmental impacts are concerned. Governments in turn are faced with the challenge of creating a more receptive environment for business, in respect of e.g. transparent laws and their improved implementation, and reductions of state pressure on decision-taking in crucial sectors such as banking.
Fourth, governance reform will be crucial in making markets work for the poor in the poorest regions and among the poorest people, as well as for improving the effectiveness of services and transfers made to these. This means improving the performance of public institutions at all levels and especially taking action to improve accountability and to avoid diversion of public resources.
In many countries governmental administrative machinery has been exposed to devastating situations during conflict. The destruction of administrative machinery and the paralysis of its operations are among the first targets of warring factions. The impact of conflicts on administrative machinery may be;
Paralysis of the organizational structures of the central and local public organizations and interruption of policy processes;
Disabling of management and monitoring systems;
Impairment of the management of basic services (electricity, water and sanitation, gas, energy and heating, roads and civil engineering, transportation, telecommunications, education, and basic health and social services);
Depletion, at all levels, of human resource abilities and skills by the loss of experienced and professional personnel, through exodus from the country, death or displacement. The remaining officials may become demoralized or apathetic, working without training and management tools in a risky environment, without salaries;
Destruction of basic management tools (office equipment and facilities; buildings, furniture, appliances, files, documents, stationery, means of communication, and transportation);
Destruction of information databases and systems and related materials and equipment;
Exhaustion of the financial resources of government and local authorities, decline in customs, revenue, taxes, and other resources and financial assets causing budgetary deficits.
Conflict-Poverty Link
Even if poverty is indeed the root cause of conflict, the effects of conflict result in more poverty. Since the effects of conflict are not merely in the short run, conflict makes poverty alleviation efforts in conflict areas challenging to begin with. A protracted conflict makes chronic poverty more costly to alleviate or eradicate especially if there are incentives for conflict to thrive. Conflict feeds into more conflict and prolongs poverty
Recognizing that conflict undermines growth by causing social and economic disintegration and by reducing development gains, the multilateral institutions , such as, the World Bank has been providing greater attention to conflict management and social stability in its development planning and oversight.
4. Policy Making in Nepal : Some Experience
The pre-1990 period of policy making and practice in Nepal shows that the excessive emphasis on political considerations in policy formulation and implementation is not a viable economic development path. Such policies may yield short-term benefits to the interest groups that control the situation, but the consequences of ignoring the stakeholders will eventually wipe out such benefits and drag the country into a serious economic crisis.
The 1990's saw a sea change in Nepalese policymaking practice. The reform process which started in the mid 1980's, mainly due to the external pressure, has seen being domesticated with government, research institutes, university departments, professionals and private sector interacting and contributing more in the policy process. National Planning Commission coordinated the overall reform programs, identified the sectors to be reformed, sequencing of reform, speed of adjustment and close monitoring and evaluation of the implementation of the reform agenda. In this process NPC worked closely with Ministry of Finance and Nepal Rastra Bank.
The economic reforms launched in the early -1990s have, to a large extent, boosted the private sector participation in investment in a variety of sector, ranging from industry and trade to hydro power development, airlines and financial sector and other services industry development in the country. Besides, improvements in trade, balance of payment, foreign exchange reserves, government revenue mobilization and fiscal balance and also an upsurge in the volume of investments by private sector are some of the impact of the policy reform that could be seen visibly. The homegrown policy reform agenda, well versed and thoroughly discussed among a variety of stakeholders, has been the focal point of the liberalization policy in Nepal since 1992.
Despite some recent improvements in policy reform processes, the policy reform has been characterized by slippages and implementation delays (mostly the result of political instability in the country after mid 90's). Stakeholders in Nepal identified a number of specific weaknesses contributing to slippages in the economic policy reform process: (i) mostly ad hoc, top-down, and supply-driven economic reform agenda; (ii) inadequate consultation processes for securing commitment and consensus from other stakeholders; (iii) failure to specify appropriate implementation arrangements; (vi) ineffective monitoring capacity and lack of a built in mechanism of policy evaluation, impact assessment and feedback system, (v) insufficient ground work in designing policy and failure to visualize the policy implication and likely impact, and (vi) the instability in government mainly due to high political instability. This needs to be corrected soon.
The political uncertainty and the growing conflict situation have compounded the task of policymaking and implementation in recent years. This calls for more homework in policy design and the consensus of the large mass of the population in implementing these policy reform prescriptions. For this, the adhocism in policy making and policy making at the desk has to be changed to a system of an intensive study on policy areas, discourse with the stakeholders at different level, monitoring and evaluation of policy implementation and the feed back mechanism in policy improvements. The rapidly developing ICT web portals can assist the policy makers in achieving these tasks. Thus, there is a greater need for institutionalizing policy formulation in the country.
Nepal has relatively good expertise and capacity to analyze policy distortions and their impact on economic performance. However, these intellectual resources are typically individual experts scattered in many public/private institutions which, unfortunately, lack the resources to conduct sustained and focused research or to network among themselves to design policy reforms, develop public policy dialogue, and build a reform consensus. This is a serious gap in policy networking capacity, which needs to be addressed to accelerate and consolidate the next generation of economic reforms. It thus, calls for establishing a vehicle for such networking among experts, policymakers, and opinion makers to build a constituency for reforms based on sound policy research.
Excerpts from the author's paper presented at a NEFAS seminar held recently in Kathmandu-ed.
