By Siraj Khan/Govinda Sharma

Nepalgunj, Feb. 21: Thursday was the fourth day Khalil Behana came to the Nepalgunj Land Revenue Office.
In desperate need of money, she sold her land and is now in the process of getting it registered in the buyer’s name. But the office staff members are really testing her patience.
“Sometimes, they say that the plot isn’t registered in their computer record; other times, they claim that my documents are incorrect. I have been going from one room to another here but to no avail,” an upset Behana sitting on the office premises said.
Similarly, Jhurri Ahir of Janaki Rural Municipality – 4 has been doing the rounds of the office for three days. “The office chief has remained absent for the past few days so there is no one to decide on my case,” she said, visibly tired and disappointed at having to come every day and return empty handed, “I have no idea when the chief will show up and when my case will be resolved.”
Patwari Tharu of Rajhena, Kohalpur Municipality-4 shares a similar grievance. “The employees always find excuses to delay our work,” she said.
Behana, Ahir and Tharu represent the story of every service seeker that visits the Land Revenue Office with their work. Almost all the people found inside the office premises on Thursday told The Rising Nepal that the employees turned them back citing server or internet issues or claimed that their documents were incomplete with no advice on how to complete them.
“But the people who work through middlemen and brokers face no hassles and their files move forward without a hitch,” claimed Samad Siddiqui, a resident of Nepalgunj Sub-Metropolitan City-11. “But these middlemen charge Rs. 300 to Rs. 1,000,” he added.
He himself was forced to employ a middleman to get his work done. “I came here for two days, went from room to room, met many people but still couldn’t get my file forwarded,” he said, adding, “So, I gave Rs. 500 to a middleman who got it done within a day.”
Meanwhile, Behana, who hails from Narainapur Rural Municipality, the remotest municipality of Banke, has been staying at a hotel at her own cost waiting for her land to be registered. “It is impossible to travel from home to office on a daily basis so I have no option but to sgay in a hotel here,” she said with great sorrow, “I have already spent more than Rs. 4,000 in my lodging and fooding expenses and it looks like I will have to spend more.”
The office was less crowded on Thursday as compared to other days. When investigating the reason, The Rising Nepal found out that the office was functioning without an officer. Navin Kumar Khadka, non-gazetted officer, had been acting as the chief of the office for the last five days.
But no one except the officer has the authority to decide and/or sign on important cases and documents. Because of this, many files had remained idle and more than 50 service seekers, that used to come daily, had not been coming these days, according to the office.
With the chief of office Prem Daulyal gone to training nearly a month ago and two officers – Ram Chandra Bhandari and Khemraj Khatri – transferred after being promoted, Khadka has been working as the interim chief of the office.
“I don’t have the authority to give any important decision due to which those coming with important cases are told to return for the last five days,” said Khadka, who added, “If no other senior officers are sent, most work will remain untouched until the chief returns.”
Having a quota for 51 employees, four of the officer posts have remained vacant in the office. Around 300-400 service seekers come to the office for

land registration, transfer, hold and various other cases.
The office has also started an online digital system in a bid to ease the processes for the service seekers from last year. However, the online system has not been functioning smoothly.
“Since the server is down, my work has been stalled for the last two days,” said Aasaram Maurya, a residence of Janaki Gaunpalika.
As per Khadka, due to some problems in the online system sometimes, people have to wait longer rather than easing their process.
“Such problem does not occur often. But when there is one, it affects the services,” said Khadka.
Along with technical errors, people have also complained about the corruption inside the office. Despite “I won’t take bribe” pamphlets pasted around the office, service seekers say such officers are hard to find.
“Even for normal work, money is demanded directly by the officers. No work is done without money here and there are enough intermediaries,” said Bijay Gupta, a resident of Nepalgunj who had come to the land revenue office for some work.
Once the service seekers enter the office, intermediaries run towards them and mention their rates along with the rates of the insiders.
“In a bid to complete the work faster, some money needs to be distributed to everyone. Or else the process is stalled by citing unwanted reasons,” said an intermediary at the office on condition of anonymity.