The budget formulation could not be finalized by Monday evening after influential lawmakers from the ruling coalition pressured the government to add projects they recommended.
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The budget presentation of the Sudurpaschim Province government has become uncertain due to the failure to reach an agreement among the ruling party lawmakers on budget sharing. The government has requested the Provincial Assembly Secretariat to postpone the budget presentation to 9 pm, saying that the budget will not be presented at that time even though the agenda was set for 5 pm, the secretariat has said.
According to Provincial Assembly Secretary Deb Bahadur Bogati, the government has sent a letter to postpone the time. But another official of the secretariat says that it is understood that the budget will not be presented even at 9 pm.
The Sudurpaschim government had prepared to present the largest budget to date in preparation by Sunday. But on Monday morning, an official involved in the budget preparation said that the budget preparation could not take final shape even by Monday evening after influential lawmakers from the ruling party pressured them to add their recommended projects. An MP said that intense bargaining is going on among the ruling party lawmakers to include projects that are favorable to them.
Chief Minister Kamal Bahadur Shah of the Congress-led government is under pressure to bargain for a budget as the two parties do not have a comfortable majority. Recently, Shah's party Congress MPs had submitted a no-confidence motion in the parliamentary party. A majority of 27 members is required, 17 from the Congress and 11 from the UML.
UML MPs have been in an internal meeting since Monday morning.
The government was preparing to increase the current fiscal year's budget by about Rs 7 billion by this morning to bring a budget of Rs 38.5 billion for the upcoming fiscal year 083/84. But the budget has been in limbo after the ruling partner UML demanded an additional budget. In the current fiscal year, the Far West had brought a budget of Rs 31.62 billion. 98 lakh.
The government had increased its previous preparations by giving a lump sum budget of Rs 70 million to the direct-party MPs and Rs 50 million to the proportional-party MPs. From that, the MPs were asked to recommend their preferred projects. An official involved in the budget preparation said that Chief Minister Kamal Bahadur Shah was under pressure after some MPs were not satisfied with that part. ‘Influential MPs of the ruling party bargained with the mentality that this budget was the last,’ the official said, ‘Resources are limited. There was no basis for increasing the size of the budget.’
An MP said that on Monday morning, the ruling partner UML informed the Chief Minister that it would leave the government.
On the other hand, the previous budget preparation process was disrupted due to internal division of power and reshuffle of the cabinet in the Far West a week ago. Congress's Bikram Singh Dhami was appointed as the minister in place of Congress's Bahadur Singh Thapa, who was the Minister of Economic Affairs.
