By Modnath Dhakal
Kathmandu, Nov. 25: A security printer has accused that the Inland Revenue Department (IRD) had deliberately barred Nepali companies from participating in the tender to print excise duty stickers.
“This tender is against the spirit of the Public Procurement Act, 2007 which has a provision to assume positive discrimination to favour Nepali entrepreneurs to include them in the procurement process,” said Manohar Raj Ghimire, Director of Mirage Printing Solution, a security-printing company based in Kathmandu.
He complained that Nepali companies were not given an opportunity to prove their expertise or competence in printing excise duty stickers, nor their incompetence was proved as such.
In a tender notice published on October 14 this year, the IRD had demanded 10 years’ experience – in security printing, supply and delivery of security paper-based excise stamps or bank notes or machine readable passports or postal stamps or national identity cards or smart driving licenses – from the interested companies to be eligible for the bidding.
Likewise, the applying companies should also have printed and supplied security paper-based excise stamps for at least two countries and 5 billion excise stamps during the last 10 years. The IRD also asked to produce evidence that the bidder has supplied the security printed items worth annual average of US$ 10 million (Rs. 1.18 billion) for the last three years.
These qualifications barred Nepali security printers as they neither have a decade long history nor the volume of business as mentioned. There are four security printing companies in Nepal – Mirage, Sama, Aroll and Sprint.
“We have suffered and there is no one to hear our grievances. My company has ISO 14298:2013, one of the documents the government asked while assessing the strength of Nepali companies following the direction from the parliamentary committee and court,” said Ghimire.
The ISO 14298:2013 specifies a minimum set of security printing management system requirements for security printers.
Ghimire said that Nepali printers can begin with small projects or a few items and breaking the tender into multiple units such as cigarettes, liquor or the like. He has invested about Rs. 450 million in the printing plant that has produced high-quality recharge cards for the Nepal Telecom and Ncell. Nepali printers are also printing bank cheques .
The domestic companies say that they could print the items at lower cost, create a system to ensure the quality of the product. It would make the country self-reliant in certain areas of security printing.
Meanwhile, the tax authority has run short of the excise duty stickers as Perum Peruri, an Indonesian company that won the bid, never showed up for the contract. As a crisis management method, the IRD has authorized the Janak Education Materials Centre Limited for the printing of about 100 million stickers.
Earlier, the Commission for Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA) had requested the Ministry of Finance to create infrastructure and enhance the capacity of Nepali printers that have the ISO certification on International Standard for Management of Security Printing Process in terms of competition, credibility, quality, transparency and cost effectiveness.
Likewise, the Public Accounts Committee of the Federal Parliament had asked the MoF to specify the procedures to allow Nepali companies to participate in the security printing and maintain positive discrimination in this regard.
Similarly, the Supreme Court had also issued a verdict to create an environment where Nepali entrepreneurs could exhibit their qualification and capacity, and promote and protect domestic enterprise and investment.
However, the tax authority said that it did not deliberately bar the Nepali companies from participating in the bidding.
“The IRD doesn’t want to take a risk since excise duty stickers are sensitive items. There were cases of fraud in the past as well. If the items are not supplied in time, the industries have to halt their production,” said Arjun Dhakal, Spokesperson of the IRD.
He also said that the IRD would move ahead paying attention to the concerns of the court and the House committee in the days to come.