Administrative error forces Baitadi residents to travel to Dadeldhura to pay land taxes

The Kathmandu Post, Nepal

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The ownership records for this ward were left behind in Dadeldhura, so locals still have to go there to pay their land taxes. This has caused unnecessary hardship for service seekers.

For nearly half a century, over 400 families in Baitadi district have been forced into a logistical quagmire, compelled to travel to the neighboring district of Dadeldhura simply to fulfill their basic obligation of paying land taxes. This enduring hardship stems from a seemingly simple, yet deeply impactful, administrative error made during the 1975-76 land survey and record management process.

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Although the state claims to be making services more accessible, locals are still forced to travel outside the district for a routine tax payment, increasing their expenses and wasting time and labour.

The fact that these records, belonging to what is now Melauli Municipality-8, were retained in Dadeldhura is a stark illustration of how bureaucratic oversights can create persistent problems for citizens. Even with Nepal's transition to a federal structure and subsequent local-level restructuring, this clerical error has remained uncorrected, highlighting a concerning lack of administrative follow-through and responsiveness.

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During that merger, Kotigaun of present-day Melauli-8 was linked to Bogata of Bhageshwar-3. We do not claim that residents of Melauli-8 must pay taxes here. They do not own houses or land in our ward, yet they come here to pay revenue. They should be able to pay in their own ward, but the legal process has not been completed.

Residents like Tarendra Bista, the ward chair of Melauli-8, rightly point out that this forces unnecessary hardship on service seekers. The disconnect is palpable: citizens vote in Baitadi but must travel to Dadeldhura for land-related matters. This situation not only increases expenses and wastes valuable time and labor but also undermines the very principle of accessible local governance that the federal system aims to achieve. The repeated appeals to authorities have yielded no concrete progress, leaving these families in a frustrating cycle of inconvenience.

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The 1976 survey was conducted from Dadeldhura. At the time, Dadeldhura surveyed Melauli and Bishalpur in Baitadi, and those areas were placed under Wards 8 and 9 of Bhageshwar. Today, those territories belong to Baitadi, but the official records remain in our office.