Nepal SC stays contract on passport printing with India

The contract for printing four million passports at the rate of $4 per piece was given to an Indian organisation a security printing and minting company after previous tenders invited by the government were cancelled. The petitions claim that the rate at which the contract was awarded was much higher than what other companies had quoted.

However,the controversy took a new turn after the Public Accounts Committee (PAC) of Parliament grilled Prime Minister Madhav Kumar Nepal on Tuesday for having defied its earlier instructions not to issue the contract to India bypassing set norms.

The Prime Minister told the committee that the decision to award the contract was taken under pressure from political and diplomatic quarters,but he did not reveal their identities. He also said that India was given the contract due to Nepals warm relations at a political and diplomatic level.

The contract is being viewed as a surrender of national interests by many here,including the Unified party of Nepal-Maoists (UCPN-M).

Its a total surrender of the countrys national interest. Even Bhutan gives its passport printing to distant European countries,and not India, UCPN-M chairman and Maoist leader Prachanda said at a public rally.