By A Staff Reporter
Kathmandu, Mar. 20: Finance Minister Janardan Sharma has said that the investable amount of the Citizens Investment Trust (CIT) should be mobilised for the national infrastructure project.
The work of keeping money in banks and financial institutions by the CIT should be stopped, he said while addressing the 32nd anniversary of CIT on Friday.

Stating that the capital formation by institutions like the CIT should be made effective, Minister Sharma said that the country needs to raise Rs. 1,700-2,000 billion now for upgrading the country.
He said that the Ministry of Finance has been continuously working to raise capital as the country has been facing the problem of liquidity crunch in recent times.
There is a need to increase employment and economic growth in the country through investment by collected capital scattered in different sectors, he said.

Sharma said that everyone should be economical in using fuel to reduce the burden of rising fuel prices.
He said that the Ministry of Finance has directed to reduce fuel consumption by 20 per cent and the same rule will be implemented in all government bodies, public enterprises and private sector.
Executive Director of the CIT Raman Nepal said that the CIT is now extending its services across the country by engaging more than 800,000 participants under 12 different programmes.
'The Ministry of Finance has been continuously working to raise capital as the country has been facing the problem of liquidity crunch in recent times.'

The paid up capital of the CIT has reached Rs. 3.27 billion while the net reserve amount till mid-January of the current fiscal year reached Rs. 184.90 billion. During the period, the CIT has invested Rs. 183.91 billion.
Executive Director Nepal said that the CIT has given high priority to selecting safe and high return national pride projects while investing.

Where is the money lost?
FM Sharma has pointed out that lack of liquidity has been created due to the tendency to hide cash in the house.
He said that the trend of hiding money had increased recently and he has started searching for such money.
He said that the trend of keeping money under the bed or under the pillow has increased to cause a lack of liquidity.

"Capital is missing somewhere. Where is the money missing from the market? I am looking for something that is not closed under the pillow and under the bed," he said. "Isn't our capital sitting idle somewhere? We, the citizens, should pay attention to this as well."

He also said that a mechanism has been developed to curb capital flight by abusing new technologies including crypto-currency, digital networking and hyper-funds.
He said, "There is a trend of capital flight by abusing various newly developed technologies. Various mechanisms have been mobilised to control it,” he said.