In the meeting of the Council of Ministers held in the first week of January last, Bharatmani Subedi, the Secretary of the Ministry of Federal Affairs and General Administration, was transferred to the Election Commission 5 months and 10 days after he took charge. When the conversation with Federal Affairs Minister Rajkumar Gupta ended, he himself asked for transfer or the minister himself transferred him.

Ravilal Panth has been brought in place of Subedi after being transferred from the Election Commission. How many days will he last, the officials of the ministry have already started counting the days .

Earlier secretaries Mukunda Prasad Niraula were transferred in 3 months and 13 days and Krishnahari Pushkar in 4 months and 9 days . Secretaries of the Ministry of Federal Affairs, Subedi, Niraula and Pushkar, who were transferred in a short period of time, are just the latest examples.

According to the records of the Ministry of Federal Affairs, in the past 10 years, the tenure of a secretary has been seen for 7 months . But the rationale of transferring the secretaries of the said ministry in three months has not been confirmed from anywhere. 

Since the development budget allocated by the federal ministry itself is insignificant, the financial aspect is not very much involved in the transfer . One of the main tasks performed by the federal ministry is staff mobilization and management. How unstable is the administrative leadership of the central agency that is responsible for the management of civil servants across the country? The transfer of secretaries can be taken as an 'indicator'.

The political and administrative leadership of the ministry seems to be busy in the management of daily employees. A former secretary of the federal ministry said that when there is no coordination between the minister and the secretary, the issue of transfer comes up. Some secretaries have asked for transfer even though they don't want to stay in the federal ministry.

"Secretaries who have a large budget and tend to try to manipulate the economy do not prefer to stay in the federal ministry". Ministers are not counted as they have direct access to the Prime Minister and Chief Secretary,'' an employee of the Ministry's Personnel Administration Division told the past with an example.

Minister and secretary why the conversation does not match? Or why secretaries are transferred in all three months? Or transferred? Will the instability seen in the administrative leadership of the ministry due to transfer affect the staff administration across the country or not? These and similar questions raised in the administrative sector have been unanswered for years.

It has not been seen that there is an organization that can answer it correctly . MP and former federal minister Bhanubhakta Joshi says that political parties should take responsibility for administrative instability. Indicating that when he was a minister, there was pressure for transfer from the political leadership, he said,   Except for special circumstances, after any secretary is transferred, it should be clear how long he will stay in that place . The method can only work if all the employees can predict in advance by which method they will be transferred.

Experts have commented that the secretaries of the ministries, who are responsible for maintaining good governance through administrative stability, are changing within three months. After the election of 2079, four ministers of the federal ministry have changed in two years.

During this period, secretaries Arjun Prasad Pokharel, Krishnahari Pushkar, Vinod Prakash Singh, Mukund Niraula, Bharatmani Subedi and Ravilal Panth are handling the ministry . In the last two years, the tenure of one secretary has been four months. During this period, four ministers have also changed . The working period of a minister is 6 months. In the first cabinet after 2079, Amanlal Modi got the opportunity to become a federal minister for 6 months and 26 days. Modi, who had two secretaries during this period, narrates his experience and says, "The administrative authority below the joint secretary is vested from the officer to the secretary". Especially in the case of transfer, the minister has no right.'

He has the experience of confrontation between the minister and the secretary, especially if there is a situation of having to work under the pressure of the political power in the case of transfer. He says that if there is no coordination between the minister and the secretary, the main dispute will be on transfer. He claims that he made a "system" and transferred during his tenure. Not only Modi but every minister and secretary has been making similar claims. A former secretary said, 'Policy reforms never seem to happen due to political pressure.' He said that most of the disputes and political maneuvers are going on in the transfer of the chief administrative officer who is sent to the local level. It is connected with the minister as soon as the approval of the secretaries is received. Ministry sources say, "This is also the dispute between Secretary Subedi and Minister Gupta". Secretary Subedi has been transferred after the conversation started to stop.' 

Disagreement between the minister and the secretary is not a disagreement for policy reforms in the administration . A joint secretary of the ministry asks, 'What is the policy reform, what has been the effect of the reform work done by which secretary and minister so far?' Especially in the ministry, rather than administrative reform, it seems that all the ministers, secretaries and staff are busy with transfer management . Administrative expert Dr. Damodar Regmi says that the trend of changing the secretary as soon as the government changes will weaken the good governance to be given to the people. 

"The employees selected by the public service will be the secretaries," said Regmi, "not being able to work is also a weakness of the minister". The secretary should also be able to 'convince' the minister. He said that a wrong trend has developed in the transfer. Regmi said that it was not often heard that secretaries were transferred due to differences in policy and reforms. In order to organize the transfer, it was mentioned in the decision number 7 (e) of the secretaries' meeting held at Singhdarbar on October 6th, under the chairmanship of the Chief Secretary Eknarayan Aryal, that the Federal Ministry will prepare an action plan to organize the transfer and submit it to the Secretary of the Prime Minister's Office within 15 days. But four months have passed since the decision. But that decision has not been implemented. Spokesperson and Joint Secretary of the Federal Ministry, Kali Prasad Parajuli, said that the matter is currently pending as the Council of Ministers has decided to cancel some complicated procedures and work plans. The proposal to organize the transfer, which should be submitted within two weeks, has not been prepared and has collapsed in the middle.

"The ministry can't even make the procedure in time, even though the secretary and the minister have been changed again, how can we expect to make other policy reforms?" said a deputy secretary of the ministry. Therefore, the joint secretaries of the ministry say that no matter who comes to the political and administrative leadership, there is only a job mentality. "The fact that the Federal Civil Bill submitted by the Ministry to the Parliament in 2075 has not yet become a law is a vivid example of that," said the Joint Secretary. In the absence of a chief administrative officer, for 7 years, 250 local levels have been operating on the basis of assistants . The management of the employees who have been adjusted has not been done yet. Criticism of the political leadership has also increased because the secretary-minister changes but does not seem to be working.

Secretary Ravilal Panth, who was transferred from the Election Commission two weeks ago as the sixth secretary after a gap of two years, says that he is trying to organize the transfer system. He said that after studying the request of the employee for transfer for a few days, he tried to set the standard of transfer only on certain days every month. Every new minister and secretary has been announcing to organize the transfer. But the draft of the standards related to transfer, work and work, which the ministry sent to the provinces and other ministries for suggestions after final discussion on June 25, 2081, is now missing. 

It was proposed to pass the draft from the secretary-level meeting on July 7. The standard was made in the activism of the then federal minister Joshi . After the change of Prime Minister, Chief Secretary, Federal Affairs Minister and Secretary in the last week of June, there has been a strong excuse to stop the standards . "I am not going to see what is in that standard," Secretary Panth said, "I will try to improve it." The federal ministry is being discussed as a transfer ministry. Even though it is called a federal matter, it is not heard after the voice that its work is not effective.