Parliamentary Special Committee finds no entry of unauthorized person to fix tax rate in budget

Kathmandu: The parliamentary special committee formed to probe the change in tax rates in the current budget with the involvement of unauthorized person finally presented its report in the House of Representatives (HoR) meeting.    
    
Committee chairperson Laxman Lal Karna presented the report in the meeting on Friday. In the report, the committee stated that it did not find the entry of unauthorized person in the Finance Ministry to change tax rate. The committee shared the finding after the study of CCTV footage, ministry's response and documents and discussion with ministry officials.    
    
"Committee found no entry of authorized person to fix tax rate. As there is a dedicated thematic committee to study the impacts of changes in tax rate, this special committee does not need to devote further in it," the report concluded.    
    
An 'NVR' system was received from the Finance Ministry, said committee chairperson Karna, adding that it also failed to show the CCTV footage of the day the committee sought for.    
    
The committee was initially provided 10 days for the investigation.    
    
The Committee had inspected CCTV installation and its recording at the ministry. In this regard, it held talks with the ministry and office bearers under it and on July 20, sent CCTV footages to the digital forensic lab of the Nepal Police for its recovery.    
The report was prepared based on documents received from the ministry, talks with office bearers, the report and details recovered from the CCTV footages and other evidences received from the Nepal Police, he said.    
Janardan Sharma had resigned as Finance Minister following the formation of a parliamentary probe committee.    
In the meeting of the House of Representatives on July 6, Speaker Agni Sapkota had announced to form an 11-member special probe committee on the matter. The probe committee that was formed in line with the Rule 177 of the HoR, Nepal Regulation, 2075 was led by lawmaker Karna.    
Other investigation committee members were lawmakers Khagraj Adhikari, Dev Prasad Gurung, Pushpa Bhusal (Gautam), Pradeep Kumar Gyawali, Bhanu Bhakta Dhakal, Bimala BK, Shakti Bahadur Basnet, Sitaram Mahato, Sarala Kumari Yadav and Surendra Prasad Yadav.    
The HoR meeting will meet next on August 2 at 1 pm.    
-----