The government's preparations to purchase weapons worth about one and a half billion rupees for the Nepal Police and Armed Police have come under controversy. Although immediate crowd control is useful and non-lethal security equipment is essential for both the police and the armed forces, the government is trying to proceed with the process it initiated three years ago to buy lethal weapons in the 'setting'.

What is the arms procurement case? We have explained in a question-and-answer manner why this is in dispute and whose interests are involved in it.

What kind of weapons is the government trying to purchase? 

government  It has prepared to buy 1,000 pistols, 1,550 shotguns, 200,000 rounds of shotgun bullets (cartridges), 300,000 rounds of shotgun rubber bullets, 24,000 cells of tear gas and 1,000,000 rounds of ammunition for the Nepal Police. Similarly, for the armed police, it is trying to buy 2300 pistols and 2000 shotguns.

Where has the process reached ? 

In the budget presented on May 15, 2082, 1.9 billion has been allocated to purchase weapons for the police. A home official says that according to the old procedure, the process of purchasing weapons worth about 6.7 million dollars for the police and about 3.8 million dollars for the armed forces has proceeded. Home Spokesman Ramchandra Tiwari says that the budget has been secured for the purchase of security materials including weapons, and the police also need weapons to increase their capacity. "But I don't know about the procurement process and the issues related to it, which stage has been reached."

For both security agencies now  Non-lethal safety equipment is required  . To meet this need, the police submitted a list of materials such as riot control gear, tear gas, blank fire, rubber bullets, multi gas guns, water cannons, fire extinguishers, diving equipment, rubber boats/motorboats, and other emergency rescue materials needed for disasters. Especially crowd control  To do this, the security agencies are forced to use excessive force due to the lack of necessary equipment. From which it seems that a lot of human damage is being done . But  The government has started the process of buying equipment different from the demand of the security agencies. That too  By resurrecting the procurement process that was in dispute three years ago. 

What was the purchasing process three years ago? 

In 2078, the then Finance Minister Janardan Sharma started the arms procurement process by transferring money. But due to the lack of foreign exchange reserves, a

news was published in Kantipur saying that when the import of daily consumables was banned, they were going to buy deadly weapons by transferring money. Then the process stopped . Although the contract was suspended at that time, the government canceled it. At that time, the purchase contract was given to the Hong Kong company through an agent company under Infinity Holdings, which was run by businessman Deepak Bhatt. At that time, Sher Bahadur Deuba was the Prime Minister, Balkrishna Khan was the Home Minister and Teknarayan Pandey was the Home Secretary. After the fact that there was a collusion in the purchase came out, the government was forced to postpone the certificate opened for the armed forces . And the resources of 84 million rupees had been secured for the police. But the government was forced to withdraw from the decision. At that time, the main opposition UML president KP Sharma Oli himself opposed the procurement process. He said that the contract was made at a high price to "eat the commission" in the purchase. But now Oli is the Prime Minister. But his own government is trying to continue the plan that Oli opposed. Sources in the Administration Department of the Ministry of Home Affairs say that the budget, which does not have a demand from the home to buy arms, has been kept in an 'abnormal' manner. Where did the trick happen? 

On 19 July 2079, the Council of Ministers decided to "suspend the purchase of weapons" for the armed forces. Although the controversial arms procurement process was stopped three years ago, the government has extended the deadline of the agreement in a 'mysterious' manner. The three-year-old contract for the purchase of police weapons has been extended until November. For this, the government amended the Public Procurement Regulations (Fourteenth) in the first week of April and included a provision to extend the term of the contracts that were previously awarded, the budget was not assured and the contracts that were postponed for various reasons.

Rule 120 of the Procurement Rules (Thirteenth Amendment) has been amended to provide that if the period of the contract has expired before the issuance of this rule, it will be automatically extended. Rule 120 (a) of the Rules has been deleted and some clauses have been added. "Except as mentioned in Rule 120, if the work cannot be completed in accordance with the purchase agreement within the specified period for any reason, the old contract can be revived if the contractor submits an application in the case of the purchase agreement that is incomplete but the period of the purchase agreement has expired or cannot be extended."

In the budget brought by the government on 15th of June after the revision of the rules, 1.9 billion rupees have been allocated for the purchase of weapons and security equipment for the police. The process was started in Chait 2078 by purchasing weapons worth about 6.6 million US dollars for the police and about 3.8 million dollars for the armed police. Warrants were opened for the armed forces to buy weapons worth about 3.8 million dollars.

After the home pressured to increase the process, the armed forces sought an opinion from the Public Procurement Monitoring Office as to whether it is possible to purchase equipment through the old process.

Armed Police Spokesman DIG Kalidas Dhauvji said earlier that a letter was sent to the procurement monitoring office stating whether buying arms through the deferred process would be legal or not. "We sent a letter for opinions, but there was no response," he says, "We have not decided what to do now."
Where did the process go at that time?

On 24 Chait 2078, the then Finance Minister Sharma ensured the resources for the purchase of arms. The home directed the police headquarters to submit the procurement plan . The police had prepared a cost estimate to buy weapons worth 67 lakh 78 thousand 400 dollars . On 20 June 2079, according to the wishes of the then government and intermediaries, the Police Headquarters signed an agreement with the Hong Kong company Minerva Corporation Limited to purchase 100 9 mm guns, 12 bore shotguns (folding) and 1,150 guns.

At that time the Inspector General of Police was Dheeraj Pratap Singh . Deepak Thapa (currently Inspector General) was in the Directorate of Management under the Administration Department who finalized the procurement process. The police headquarters signed a purchase agreement with Mercury Trading, a local agent managed by Manoj Agarwal, an employee of Infinity Holdings, to buy from Hong Kong's Minerva Corporation. On 29 Baisakh 2079, an agreement was reached with Mercury Trading Pvt Ltd of Lazimpat, the Nepali agent of the company, to buy 100 9mm pistols for $669,000 and folding shotguns for $2,494,350.

Similarly, bids were called on 19 Baisakh 2079 to buy 2 lakh rounds of shotgun cartridges, 3 lakh rounds of shotgun rubber bullets, 24 thousand rounds of 0.38 mm tear gas and 10 lakh 20 thousand rounds of 9 mm ammunition. About two months later, on June 13, 2079, a purchase agreement was signed with the Hong Kong company through Infinity's local agent company for these four types of lethal weapons.

The police headquarters had an agreement with Global Constellation Trading, the local agent of Nihal Trading in Hong Kong, to purchase 200,000 rounds of shotgun bullets for 432,000 dollars, rubber bullets for shotguns for 950,400 dollars, 24,000 rounds of tear gas bullets for 799,920 dollars, and 1,000,000 rounds of ammo for 13,28,400 dollars . To buy all these arms/bullets, the police headquarters had entered into an agreement with Deepak Bohra, an employee of Infinity, for a contract of 6673 thousand 710 dollars.

Similarly, the armed police opened an LC with Mercury Trading, a local agent managed by Agrawal, an employee of Infinity Holdings, to buy 2,300 Italian Beretta brand pistols from Hong Kong's Minerva Corporation on June 16, 2079. Aggarwal is the Managing Director of Fox Travel Agency under Infinity. This amount was fixed at 25 crore 17 lakh rupees according to the exchange rate of that time. On the same date, a letter of credit was opened from Rashtra Bank for the purchase of 2,000 shotguns of "Toros brand" made in Brazil with Perun Enterprises, the agent company of Hong Kong's "Aris Technologies Limited" in Hong Kong, worth about 1.798 million dollars (equivalent to about 235.55 million).