Nepal: Janardan Sharma re-appointed as the Finance Minister

Kathmandu: Janardan Sharma, who was proved innocent in the budget tweaking case, has been re-appointed as the finance minister. On Sunday, President Bidya Devi Bhandari appointed him as a minister to handle the responsibilities of the Finance Ministry.

Sharma resigned from his post this month after the parliament formed a probe committee to investigate allegations of tax tweaking on the incumbent fiscal year’s annual budget.

Pressure mounted over Janardan Sharma since June 13 after a report in the local newspaper (Annapurna Daily) where two outsiders were brought to change some taxes just before the presentation of the budget in parliament on May 29.

The House of Representatives, this month, formed an 11-member inquiry committee to probe Sharma. Speaker Agni Prasad Sapkota proposed the names of 11 members of the parliamentary inquiry committee received from the political parties.

The probe committee includes four lawmakers including Khagaraj Adhikari, Pradip Gyawali, Bhanubhakta Dhakal and Bimala BK, as members of the main opposition CPN-UML. Likewise, the committee will have Pushpa Bhusal and Sitaram Mahato from the Nepali Congress, Dev Prasad Gurung and Shakti Bahadur Basnet from the Maoist Center.

Sarala Kumari Yadav of Unified Socialist, Surendra Yadav of Janata Samajbadi Party (JSP), and Laxman Lal Karna of Loktantrik Samajbadi Party are also included in the committee.