President Bidya Devi Bhandari.                                                                                                       Photo: RSS

November 26: President Bidya Devi Bhandari has expressed her concerns over the degrading fiscal discipline among governments bodies. 
Inaugurating a newly constructed building of the Auditor General amidst a programme on Thursday, the Head-of-the-State said the role of the Office of the Auditor General was vital in maintaining and promoting fiscal discipline. She further made it clear that the role of federal, provincial and local governments was equally important in implementing and establishing fiscal discipline.    
According to the state-owned national news agency RSS, the president expressed concerns stating that the volume of arrears is increasing every year despite measures to downsize it. The president underlined the need of finding a right approach to address the issue.

On the occasion, the president also expressed her concern over the nation’s ballooning trade deficit and said, “It is a matter of concern that disproportionate ratio of export and import has led to the skyrocketing trade deficit and the nation’s dependence on agro-products has also increased.”    
She was of the opinion that the Office of the Auditor General could contribute to the entrepreneurship development of people for the building of self-sufficient economy. The president further expressed her hope that the Office of the Auditor General would play a leading role in the implementation of fiscal discipline and expressed her happiness over the decision to introduce an IT-enabled audit system, RSS reported.   
Stating that the scope of OAG jurisdictions had been expanded with the enforcement of federalism, the president urged the Office not to leave any stone unturned to fulfill its role to oversee whether the nation’s fund has been rightly utilised.    
The total arrears worth Rs 676 billion of the government bodies have to be cleared, according to data submitted by the Auditor General Tanka Mani Sharma. The figure is increasing every year.