Saroj Bista's Blog

Through this blog, I have tried to examine the provisions contained in the New Statistics Bill which is currently in the Upper House of Nepal's Parliament.  Initial Impression At present, Statistics Bill 1958 is prevalent in Nepal that underwent 8 amendments since its formulation. The last amendment was made in 2010. In this 10 years, the entire world including Nepal saw a tremendous change in the definition of statistics, data and governance. Specific to Nepal, the devolution of powers into federal, provincial and local governments has specific interests in terms of statistics production, custodian, publication and use.  Objectives that I think the new bill has envisioned achieving: I saw from the Preamble that the Government of Nepal has realized that the objective widened from significant of statistics for national planning to the production, processing, storage, publication and distribution plus influence in policy making in all three tiers of governments. I find this a ve...

Have you been struggling to find in English  the powers, functions and duties of Judicial Committees constituted pursuant to Chapter 8 of the Local Level (Operation) Act 2017 ? I did. The provisions contained in the Act mandate the committee to undertake and carry out two specific functions:  i) Settle Disputes through the Committee, and ii) Settle Disputes through mediation only.  Here are the English versions that might help:  A. Nature of disputes that the Judicial Committee can settle:  (a) Border/boundary of land, dams, ditches or distribution and use of water (b) Damage to other crops (c) Pasture land, green fodder, fuel wood, (d) Unpaid wages (e) Lost or found of domestic animals and birds (f) Not caring and looking after elderly citizens (g) Not providing decent food and clothing or education to minor children or husband-wife (h) House rent and house rent facility with amount up to twenty-five hundred thousand annuall...

The blog explains why is it an opportune moment to institutionalize open data initiatives in Nepal more specifically to local governments. This blog is originally published in the GovLab's Medium. Your feedback would be invaluable. Please follow the link:   https://bit.ly/2BddRfX 

In my previous blog, I mentioned briefly how one participates in the Social Security Scheme based on contribution. It is required that both the employers as well as employees should get listed. Here is what both the parties can do to get listed. However, it is important that the employer initiates to register itself for getting listed.   A detailed user manual is provided by the Social Security Fund here . However, I would try to narrate it to develop a preliminary understanding on what needs to be done: For Employers Login to Social Security Fund Website   For signing up, goto Registration Tab and select Employer Registration , that allows you to fill certain details and receive your Submission Number .   Once you have your Submission Number, you can log in to fill details about your organization The details typically include the following: Name of the employer Employer type Nature of the Employer Classification of Industry   Alert Sourc...

The Contribution-based Social Security Fund is formally announced and launched today in Nepal with a wider ambition to protect the status of workers in Nepal. For the first time, the private sector employees are brought into the consideration of the Government for further security.   The scheme is based on the Act for managing to provide Contribution-based Social Security that was formulated on August 13, 2017.  See its Regulation here .  In this blog, I have provided some of the key characteristics of the Act that has enabled this day to come. In my further blogs, I will be writing more about it.   Dependent Family members identified as follows: Husband or wife Son, daughter-in-law, daughter Father, mother, mother-in-law, father-in-law Grandson or granddaughter No entitlement to social security without contribution Both employer and employees must register to become eligible for the scheme Deposit of contribution on a regular and monthly ba...

Hello valued readers,  I just wanted to share a research around Open Data and its role in improving the disaster relief in Nepal.  I had had a chance to become a part of this research when I participated in the Community Solutions Program (CSP) organized by IREX with the support of US Department of States. My experiences are published as a blog . This is a wonderful opportunity to enhance your career as the opportunities are unlimited, you should definitely check this out. Please feel free to reach out to me if my help were needed. The GovLab , my host organization provided me an opportunity to undertake responsible task involving interview of key open data champions/practitioners in Nepal as well as review of secondary information.  The research is accessible here:  http://odimpact.org/files/case-nepal.pdf