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By Narayan Prasad Mishra

We all know that laws, rules, and regulations are made and are to be made for the benefit of all the people concerned on the subject. They are made for good governance and good management. At the same time, we all know that no laws and rules are formulated to trouble anyone. It is also understandable that sometimes you find the rules do not cover the issues or are not clear on how to tackle them. But from our common sense, we can definitely say that we should have an approach to thinking over the issues with an attitude of helping the people and solving the problems by applying the existing rules to the maximum extent, but not with an attitude of creating more problems and giving troubles.

But in our country, you find the situation is just the opposite. When you go to get work done in any office – District Administration, Municipality, Tax, Land, Survey, Transportation, Telephone, Water, Sewage, Electricity, etc., you can hardly see a cooperative attitude, helping attitude, or positive attitude. As soon as they see your papers or issues, it seems they certainly view the situation in a way that allows them to create problems and present obstacles to getting your work done rather than facilitating its completion. By doing this, they think they can put you in such a situation that you will be forced to accept their condition of taking a bribe – whether small or large, depending on the value of your work. I always feel this way when I go to any office. I get disturbed anticipating this situation when I think of going to any office for work. I also hear similar sentiments from people who have experience with office work regarding their tasks. Of course, you sometimes encounter exceptional things. Once in a blue moon, you find someone who is truly cooperative and helpful.

Recently, I visited the District Administration Office in Kathmandu and two ward offices of the Kathmandu Municipality regarding the Nonresident Nepalese Citizenship Certificate for my daughter and my grandchildren, who were born in the USA. We began our process on July 7, 2024, at the District Administration Office by submitting applications as prescribed by the rules. There was a large crowd gathered, akin to any Nepalese festival, with various issues such as obtaining new citizenship certificates, copies of old citizenship certificates, national identity cards, passports, nonresident Nepalese citizenship certificates, etc. The lines were not in disciplined order, and almost everyone was anxious to reach the officer’s window by pushing and jostling like frogs in a field. There was no system of orderly token distribution or automated paper processing. The condition of the people waiting, many of whom were elderly, sick, or frail, was difficult to witness. All the officers and employees seemed busy with their work and hardly had time to listen to anybody’s problems. There was no separate section or window dedicated to NRN citizenship, which I believe is necessary to expedite and facilitate the process for people coming from abroad for that purpose.

One requirement was to provide a recommendation and certification proving that the applicant is a citizen of the country and entitled to get the NRN citizenship, known as “Sanakhat,” in Nepali, which I did for my daughter and grandchildren. However, when they checked my citizenship certificate, they did not find it in their records. I heard that often happens in that office with many people due to missing, torn, or lost files. Therefore, they insisted that I needed to obtain a new citizenship certificate with a recommendation from my ward office in Kathmandu Municipality. Additionally, I recently obtained my National Identity Card (Rashtriya Parichaya Patra), which they issued. I submitted it, hoping it would resolve the issue with my citizenship certificate. However, they refused to accept it, which I found illogical and senseless. Instead, they required me to bring another person to sign the “Sanakhat,” who is a citizen of the country and possesses a citizenship certificate issued by Kathmandu Municipality. I had no choice but to comply, as their word was law there. I called my nephew for this purpose.

Regarding the applications for my grandchildren, they stated that as the grandparent from the maternal side, I was not eligible to sign as their relative and needed someone from their father’s side to fulfill this requirement, which seemed rather humorous to me. While the new citizenship law allows for the children to receive citizenship certificates based on their mother’s recommendation, they do not recognize maternal grandparents for this purpose. When we explained that there were no relatives from their father’s side currently in Nepal, as they were all in America, they insisted on obtaining a document from the ward office to verify this before any Nepalese citizen could sign the “Sanakhat” for that purpose. This was another amusing aspect of the process for me.

On the other hand, the ward office presented many artificial reasons for not writing a letter to the District Administration Office. One of them was that they hadn’t received a letter from the DAO. Without it, they argued, how could they write a letter to that office based solely on our statement of needing a letter? This situation fully illustrates the non-cooperative culture prevalent in Nepali offices. One who cannot tolerate such a culture cannot adapt to this country and feel like moving somewhere else. It is very disturbing and frustrating.

The third issue concerned the relationship certificate, which was one of the documents required for the NRN citizenship certificate. The birth certificates of my grandchildren prove that my daughter is their mother. My citizenship certificate and my daughter’s citizenship certificate prove that I am her father, thereby establishing that I am the grandfather of my grandchildren. However, Hari Sharma, the Assistant Chief District Officer, was not convinced to accept this logic and insisted that we submit a separate document titled “Relationship Certificate” for this purpose. When I politely presented my arguments to him, he became angry with me, despite my efforts to request his understanding and kindness, all to no avail.

Nevertheless, despite facing numerous hurdles and obstacles that would not exist in any civilized country, we managed to complete our tasks by navigating through the District Administration Office and the Municipality’s Ward Offices over several days, often in heavy rain. We encountered many unexpected challenges and humiliations and learned to endure insults and disrespect during this process. I strongly feel that the culture of creating problems instead of solving them and of giving problems instead of helping people mostly prevails in our country. However, we boast the most refined democracy according to our constitution. We must change this detrimental culture and establish a culture focused on completing tasks in the most efficient manner possible and assisting people to the fullest extent permissible under our democracy and constitution in all offices in Nepal. I strongly feel that the government should initiate an effective program to change this detrimental culture. Simultaneously, I believe that the Staff College should develop a course for it and incorporate it into their training.

narayanshanti70@gmail.com

The views expressed in this article are the author’s own and do not necessarily reflect People’s Review’s editorial stance.