A large number of Village Development Committee (VDC) secretaries have sought their transfer from Terai districts owing to insecurity.

According to Ram Kumar Shrestha, acting Secretary at the Ministry of Local Development, secretaries of VDCs in Terai districts have started applying for transfer elsewhere.

Briefing the Constituent Assembly Elections Monitoring Special Parliamentary Committee, the Ministry officials informed that secretaries of remote hilly VDCs, too, were still operating out of district headquarters.

They informed that 366 VDCs – of the total 3912 VDCs in the country – were running without secretaries. At a time when the local bodies are without elected or nominated political leadership, the secretaries appointed by the government are the only ones running them.

At the parliamentary committee, Minister for Local Development Dev Gurung said that vacant positions will be filled by recruiting temporary secretaries on contract basis. He said people of Madhesi origin will be given priority to fill the positions in Terai VDCs.

Of late, government employees, particularly of hilly origin, have been increasingly targeted for abductions and killings by various armed outfits active in Terai region.

On Tuesday, Janatantrik Terai Mukti Morcha (JTMM-Jwala Singh) had issued a warning to officials of hilly origin to leave Terai within a week. Even as the country braces for Constituent Assembly (CA) elections on November 22, the deteriorating security in Terai region threatens to affect the election process.