The development expenditure worth 20 million rupees has not been spent in Parsa district in the current fiscal year as secretaries of most of Village Development Committees (VDC) fled to district headquarters one year ago due to Maoists’ threats.

Of the total 82 VDCs’ of the district, 15 secretaries had returned after the district development committee Parsa corresponded with them to return to the village following the announcement of unilateral ceasefire by the Maoists.

All secretaries of the 82 VDC’s of the district had left the villages from November 24, 2004 following the Maoists threat to resign from their post.

Three million and 750 thousand rupees allocated to each VDCs’ as development expenditure remain unclaimed in absence of secretaries in villages.

Project officer of the District Development Committee (DDC), Parsa, Keshav Bimali, informed that they were releasing only administrative expenditure and allowances of elderly people as the development work of the VDCs’ remained stalled in the absence of VDC secretaries.

“Secretaries are returning to their respective VDCs’ following the improvement in the security situation of the district, so the development work will start soon,” Bimali said.

“The secretaries go to villages sometimes and distribute allowances for elderly people and return back as the Maoists had threatened them not to open their offices,” he added.

The development work of the district came to halt in absence of secretaries, who play pivotal role for development.

The meeting of the district security committee has asked the DDC to take action against those secretaries who refuse to go to the place where they are stationed, the vernacular daily Nepal Samacharpatra reported on Tuesday.

In their part, VDC secretaries complained that they could not go to villages due to security reasons.

Distribution of allowance to elderly people and the work of updating the list of elderly people were also affected due to the absence of secretaries. People are having problems with birth registration and citizenship certificates due to the absence of secretaries, the report adds.