Kathmandu, August 24
Altogether, 15 candidates have applied for the post of chairperson at Nepal Telecommunications Authority (NTA).
The applicants include former chairperson of NTA Digambar Jha; former secretary at Ministry of Communication and Information Technology (MoCIT) Sushil Ghimire; NTA Board Member Chandra Mani Chaulagain; NTA Senior Directors Ananda Raj Khanal and Purushottam Khanal; former managing director of Nepal Telecom (NT) Buddhi Prasad Acharya, and former deputy managing director of NT Dev Narayan Yadav.
Similarly, other candidates include former deputy managing directors of NT Rabindra Jha, Shiva Bhusan Lal, Khadga Basnet and Madhu Sudan Karmacharya; former general manager at Janak Shikshya Samagri Ltd Anil Jha; Chief Executive Officer at Smart Mobile in Burundi, Bhupendra Bhandari; ICT Specialist at United Nations Children’s Fund Ujjwal Pradhananga and Sales Director at Ncell Rohit Rauniar.
Publishing a notice on August 18, the MoCIT had sought applications from interested and eligible candidates for the post. As per the notice, applicants should be between the age of 30 and 65 years and also have 10 years of experience in the telecommunications sector.
The government has decided to fill the vacant leadership post at NTA through open competition.
The post of the chairperson at the country’s telecommunications regulatory body has been vacant since July 4 after the
government decided to withdraw all political appointments made by the previous Sher Bahadur Deuba-led government, including Digambar Jha who was the chairperson of NTA then.
Previously, the executive post at NTA was being filled through political appointments.
Following the decision of the government to sack Jha, the government had formed a committee under the coordination of Secretary at MoCIT Mahendra Man Gurung to recommend eligible candidates for NTA’s vacant leadership post. However, the committee once again came up with the decision to reappoint Jha under political influence.
“After we have gone through all the applications, we will select the three best candidates and forward their names to the Cabinet,” said Gurung, adding that the Cabinet will then appoint the chairperson from among the three shortlisted candidates.
Along with the formation of the new government and the changing priorities of the government, NTA has not been able to execute a number of planned projects. One such plan includes issuing telecom infrastructure service licence. Though it has been almost a year that NTA sought request for proposals for telecom infrastructure licence and collected applications from five foreign telecom firms, NTA has not been able to issue the said licence.
Written by Nikki Hamal
This news first appeared on https://thehimalayantimes.com/business/15-candidates-apply-for-post-of-nta-chairperson/ under the title “15 candidates apply for post of NTA chairperson”. Bolchha Nepal is not responsible or affiliated towards the opinion expressed in this news article.
