The government agencies could recover around Rs95.67 million from the public servants who failed to submit their property details of last fiscal year 2016-17 in fines.

As per the clause 50 of Corruption Prevention Act-2002, any public official failing to submit the updated statement of property in his her name or in the name of his or her family members along with source of income, shall be liable to a fine of Rs5,000.

As many as 19,134 public officials failed to submit property details in the last fiscal year, according to National Vigilance Centre (NVC).  While fining them by Rs5,000 each,  a total of Rs95.67 million could be collected.

After the watchdog submits the report of the property details to Commission for Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA), the anti-graft body orders the concerned state or government agencies to fine those failing to submit the property details. The NVC on Sunday submitted the details to the CIAA.

CIAA Spokesperson Padam Prasad Pandey said, “We will soon instruct concerned state or government agencies to fine those who fail to submit property details through 

the meeting of CIAA commissioners. The concerned government agencies will inform us after recovering fines from them.”

As per the Corruption Prevention Act, all public servants are required to submit their property details as well as that of their family members in a prescribed format to the NVC within 60 days after the end of the fiscal year. 

The NVC could extend the deadline by up to 30 days if it finds a valid reason for delay. Those failing to submit the statement of property even after the extended deadline will have to pay fines. The concerned body (CIAA) may investigate officials suspected to have illegal property in their name or their family members’ names. 

“We keep close eye on the public servants who failed to submit property details,” said Pandey. CIAA officials say they do not initiate investigation into property details of any public servant based on the details submitted by them. “But, these details become important when complains are filed against any public servant charging him or her of amassing property illegally,” said Pandey.  

As many as 4,525 civil servants, 11,455 teachers, 1,445 army personnel, 113 police and, 1596 others failed to submit property details.  A total of 449,140 public servants submitted their property details in the last fiscal year.

Although the NVC collected statement of property details from all public officials including politicians holding constitutional positions and the government staffers, it failed to include property details of the elected representatives of the local government officials in the report submitted to the CIAA.

NVC Spokesperson Bishnu Raj Lamichhane said, “We could not collect the property details of all elected local representatives because only those who were elected in the first phase were liable to submit details of the last fiscal year as per the law. We will include their property details in the next year’s report by incorporating the details of last fiscal year too.”