April 11: The process of appointing the chairman of the Securities Board of Nepal (SEBON) has been halted temporarily. Sources informed New Business Age that the recommendation committee suspended the process after Finance Minister Barsha Man Pun expressed dissatisfaction with the initial phase of the application for the appointment of the board’s chairman.

The government had formed a three-member recommendation committee headed by the Vice Chairman of the National Planning Commission, Dr Min Bahadur Shrestha, on January 17 to fill the post of SEBON chairman, which has remained vacant since January 5.

The committee includes Finance Secretary Dr Krishna Hari Pushkar and Professor Udaya Niraula.

The committee has already prepared the appointment procedure and carried out the initial works. It collected applications from February 28 to March 13 and shortlisted five candidates out of 19 applicants on April 7. The shortlisted candidates were asked to submit their action plans by April 11. However, the recommendation committee has now decided to postpone the process.

Among the five shortlisted candidates are Dr Nabaraj Adhikari and Muktinath Shrestha, the executive director of the board, Krishna Bahadur Karki, Chief Executive Officer of Nepal Stock Exchange Limited, Chiranjivi Chapagain, former chairman of the then Insurance Board, and Santosh Shrestha.

Sources indicate that the Finance Minister expressed displeasure with the shortlisted candidates. In addition to these five, there were other applicants, including Krishnaraj Pokharel, Dr. Gopal Prasad Bhatt, Niraj Giri, Dr. Keshav Prasad Shrestha, Krishna Bahadur Adhikari, Dr. Raghuraj Kafle, Praveen Pandak, Surya Prasad Adhikari, Ramdev Yadav, Sitaram Thapaliya, Dr. Bimalkumar Tiwari, Ramakrishna Khatiwada, Khagendra Katuwal, and Mukti Aryal.

The recommendation committee decided to halt the process due to the Finance Minister's dissatisfaction. The tenure of SEBON chairman is of four years, and the assessment of candidates by the recommendation committee is based on criteria outlined in section 5 of the Securities Act, 2063. The assessment criteria include professional action plan (100 marks), educational qualification (12 marks), professional action plan presentation (18 marks), and interview (30 marks).

SEBON is the main regulatory body for the securities market in Nepal, which has a capital of over Rs 32 billion. The absence of a chairman for over three months has stalled the approval of public issuance of shares. The executive director of the board, currently Nabaraj Adhikari, is responsible for daily administrative work, but major policy decisions require a chairman. Currently, there are over 91.33 million applications for securities issuance pending.

The Ministry of Finance has a keen interest in the development of the securities market, as it reflects the economy. The government collects significant revenue from this market. From mid-February to mid-March alone, the government collected over Rs 440 million in tax from investors in the secondary securities market. The government benefits when the stock market performs well.