KATHMANDU: Education Minister Mahabir Pun has warned that if Tribhuvan University (TU) does not publish examination results within three months, the interim government will withhold its grant. He also stated that the provision of the prime minister being the chancellor should be removed to end the politicization taking place in the university. Minister Pun believes the root cause of this short-term problem is deep. One of the reasons is the recruitment of favorites into university services based on political influence and access. The arbitrary appointing done through the Executive Council by rendering the University Service Commission ineffective is weakening the academic and administrative quality of the university.

It has been six and a half years since the advertisement for the recruitment of teachers and staff at Mid-West University (MWU) was last opened. Out of 401 approved posts, 107 are vacant. The University Service Commission, the body responsible for recommending personnel appointments and promotions, is inactive. However, the Executive Council is recruiting people under contractual and partial service. Currently, 170 teachers and staff are employed on contract, and 100 teachers are working on a partial basis.

Similarly, in nine universities across the country, including MWU, a total of 4,447 teachers and staff have been appointed on contract and partial service, bypassing the Commission. This is the data collected by Nepal News. This trend shows that the practice of holding the Commission hostage and recruiting favorites through the Council is escalating.

Currently, eleven universities are operating in Nepal. Eight are funded by the federal government, and three are run at the community level. In nine of these, the Commission’s role is crucial for appointments and promotions. However, at Kathmandu University and Lumbini Buddhist University, the practice is to form a recruitment committee to perform the work. In those with a commission, the council is actively making appointments and promotions.

Most university commissions are unable to open advertisements for open competition. They are also plagued by the problem of being unable to finalize previous advertisements. This has obstructed the process of bringing in skilled human resources through open competition, and consequently, the malpractice of recruiting ad hoc and influential personnel without competition, based on political access, has increased in universities.

One example: Bharati Joshi, the Chairperson of the MWU Service Commission, could not issue a single advertisement during her four-year tenure. Her only achievement was publishing the result of an advertisement opened by the previous commission, whose examination was held in 2019 but whose result had been withheld. Joshi could not accomplish any other work. She departed on April 4, 2025.

At Tribhuvan University, there are 8,124 approved posts. As of mid-June, at least 821 positions were vacant, but the Service Commission has recently accelerated the recruitment process. However, even at TU, the Executive Council has bypassed the Service Commission and recruited 968 on contract and 29 on temporary service. Additionally, 2,300 partial teachers have been appointed at TU based on political access.

Nepal Sanskrit University (NSU) has also not opened an advertisement for three and a half years. It had called for applications for open competition recruitment in mid-March 2022.

However, the process took more than two years to conclude. The Nepal Students’ Union (Nepali Congress-affiliated) and the All Nepal National Free Students’ Union-Revolutionary (Maoist-affiliated) staged protests there, raising questions about the transparency of the advertisement. Currently, a budget is being allocated for 915 teachers and staff. Approximately 70 of those positions are still vacant. There is no certainty when an advertisement will be opened for those posts.

While provincial-level universities have recently begun to be established, the youngest university in the country under the federal act is Rajarshi Janak University (RJU), which was established in 2017. Its Service Commission is even more helpless. It first advertised various positions on January 5, 2022. Even though three and a half years have passed since the tenure of Chairman Shailendra Labh ended, the appointments have not been finalized. The Commission is without officials. The Council is taking advantage of this situation and actively recruiting employees on contract. An advertisement for 12 teachers and staff under contract and daily wage was opened on February 20, 2025. Currently, 55 are recruited on contract and 18 on a partial basis there.

When RJU was established, the Ramswarup-Ramsagar Multiple Campus operating under TU was merged into it. Out of the 102 approved positions, 22 people who were adjusted from that campus were in permanent service. Among them, nine have retired. Thirteen are currently working. Former Chairman Labh says, “The Service Commission is still vacant. There might be a compulsion to run the university only with contract teachers and staff after the remaining personnel retire.”

The situation at Nepal Open University (NOU) is similar to that of RJU, where 68 positions are approved. However, permanent recruitment has not been possible. The internal and open advertisements issued by the Commission in 2021 are stalled, due to which the university has not received permanent human resources even after nine years of its establishment. Registrar Govind Singh Bista says, “The university is running on contract and partial human resources. The Service Commission is unable to work due to disputes.”

Pokhara University (PU) is also unable to perform its duties. An open advertisement has not been issued there since 2022. Chairman Tirtha Raj Aryal and member Uma Nath Baral, appointed to the Commission in 2022, are without work. The Council, however, is recruiting on full-time, course-based, and service contracts. With only about one and a half years left in their four-year tenure, they are unhappy with the university’s working style for being unable to issue even one advertisement. Aryal says, “We have been appointed, but we have not been given any work so far. Why were we appointed if they were not going to give us work?”

At Pokhara University, out of 751 approved posts, 277 are vacant. The number of contract and partial teachers and staff has reached 213. The Service Commission of Far Western University (FWU) has been unable to fill 87 vacant positions for three years. However, the Council has already recruited 105 people on contract.

Purbanchal University (PU) has 448 approved posts. Among them, 147 are vacant. The advertisement issued on December 27, 2024, to fill these posts has not been finalized due to the Commission being without officials. Tek Prasad Adhikari, the University Information Officer, states that 105 people are currently employed on contract. He says, “The recruitment process is halted because there are no officials in the Commission. Because of this, we are forced to hire on contract service.”

Ghanshyam Bhattarai, Chairman of the TU Service Commission, says that if the Council regularly provides the vacant posts, there would not be such a huge obstacle in university service. He says, “The Executive Council does not regularly provide the vacant posts, and it hides all the vacant posts, sending only a few.” He adds, “Recently, we have been operating the advertisement process according to the calendar.”

More recruitment than posts

With the Executive Council dominating the jurisdiction of the Service Commission, more teachers and staff are being recruited than the approved posts. In TU, the approved posts for the assistant professor level for teachers are 428, while 984 people are currently employed. Of those, 611 are on contract. For staff, the approved posts for the gazetted First Class Officer level are 75, while 118 people are employed. The approved posts for the gazetted Second Class Officer level are 276, while 372 are employed.

The Agriculture and Forestry University (AFU) also has 130 more people than the approved posts. Their salaries and allowances are paid from internal resources.

Buddhinath Dhungana, the Administration Chief, says, “The government does not provide the posts. The university here has an urgent need for staff.” Currently, 100 non-categorized and 30 categorized employees are kept on contract.

Mid-West University (MWU) is in an even worse financial crisis due to excess human resources. The post of Assistant Professor is 141. However, 197 people are employed. While the post for instructor is zero, two permanent staff and eight monthly/daily wage staff are working. This university had formed a committee to study the management of partial teachers and staff. Yadu Prasad Gyawali, an assistant professor and member of the committee, says, “With more people recruited than the approved posts, the university is facing problems managing the financial burden. Monthly salaries have to be paid only once every two to three months.”

The chancellor’s restraint on the council’s arbitrariness

MWU opened advertisements for contract recruitment about 12 times from 2020 to 2024. Most of these advertisements were halted due to disputes. The advertisement that opened in 2021 for 25 teachers (researchers) with PhD and post-PhD qualifications was the most controversial. After protests from teachers, the advertisements for five teachers in 2020, seven teachers and staff in Kartik 2078, seven teachers and staff in January 2022, two teachers two months after, and four teachers in 2023 were stopped. This was on the instruction of the then Prime Minister, Pushpa Kamal Dahal, who is also the Chancellor.

Even though the contract advertisements were postponed, the partial teachers demanded to be kept on contract. According to Chhabi Bohora, Chairman of the Aansik Pradhyapak Sanga, previous officials made direct contract appointments for their own people by getting decisions passed by the Council. He complains that those working on a partial basis have been ignored for years. He says, “When the previous Executive Council appointed 40 people on contract, our demands were not addressed.”

Yadav Prasad Lamichhane, the then Vice-Chancellor of Nepal Sanskrit University, appointed seven people on contract on July 11, 2024, despite a strong dispute with the Registrar. However, the then Prime Minister, KP Sharma Oli, who is also the Chancellor, instructed that the appointment be revoked. Vice-Chancellor Lamichhane then resigned from his post on August 11.

Expenditure without work

The university’s service commission has a provision for two officials, including a chairman and a member representing the public service commission. The Chairman receives a monthly salary, allowance, vehicle, driver, cook, housing, hospitality, and communication expenses equivalent to the Vice-Chancellor, and the member receives the same as the Registrar. By this calculation, approximately Rs 400,000 per month is spent on two officials.

Seven university commissions have the provision of appointing full-time officials. TU, NSU, MWU, FWU, NOU, AFU, and RJU have full-time service commissions. The annual expenditure for a commission in one university is Rs 5 million. By this calculation, the expenditure for seven universities amounts to Rs 35 million. Looking at their work, they hardly do anything except conduct recruitment once in their tenure (three or four years).

Educationist Bidya Nath Koirala questions the relevance of the commission and suggests two possibilities for recruitment in university service. The first is to form a University Service Commission (Recruitment Committee) as needed and dissolve it once the work is done. This provision is in place at Kathmandu and Lumbini Buddhist Universities. The second is to select and send teachers and staff for all universities from a central-level structure. This model is similar to the way the Public Service Commission selects and sends civil servants nationwide. Koirala says, “I consider the first option to be suitable. After all, the practice at Kathmandu University seems to be good.”

Research excellence after Supreme Court restriction

There was a growing tendency in universities, including TU, to recruit people on partial, contract, and temporary service based on power and access and then make them permanent through special internal competition via the Commission. The Supreme Court halted this trend in February 2024. With that, the arbitrariness of TU and other universities to make limited individuals permanent through special competition has been stopped. However, the recruitment on a partial and contract basis by rendering the Commission inactive has not ceased.

Contract and temporary staff previously agitated for automatic permanence. They would not allow the Commission to advertise for open competition.

A joint bench of Supreme Court Justices Nakul Subedi and Sunil Kumar Pokharel annulled the Staff-Teacher Service Regulations passed by the TU Assembly in 2021. That regulation stated that ’employees who have been appointed to the university’s regular posts with the approval of the central office and have served continuously for 10 years in temporary or contract service are eligible to participate in the special internal open competition.’ The petition was filed by TU students Ramesh Bista and Manita Khatri.

Following the Supreme Court’s decision, this issue has spread to partial staff. Those recruited on a partial basis without competition are agitating to be moved to contract service. The single demand of the partial teachers working at TU is to be placed on contract with a monthly salary. Gokul Limbu, Chairman of the Aansik Pradhyapan Sanga, says the impact of the Commission being inactive is affecting them. He says, “We have no objection if the university regularly opens advertisements for vacant posts through the Service Commission. We are also ready to compete.”

TU has created a new regulation to make individuals with PhDs and articles published in international journals permanent without a written examination based on ‘Research Excellence.’ Based on this regulation, the Commission advertised for 100 Assistant Professors on June 4, 2025. Journalism Professor Chiranjivi Khanal says, “While the practice of recruiting qualified human resources based on academic excellence is good, there is a doubt that it will introduce new irregularities if impartiality is not maintained.”

Senate decisions stalled

The highest body of the university is the University Assembly (Senate). The Prime Minister remains the Chairman of the Assembly in the capacity of Chancellor. The Finance Secretary is a member. The Assembly mainly determines policies and approves long-term plans, annual budgets, and programs. However, the decisions related to posts and budgets made by the Assembly chaired by the Prime Minister are currently not being implemented. Although the necessary posts in the university are passed by the Assembly, they end up ‘dumped’ at the Ministry of Finance (MoF).

Although Nepal Sanskrit University’s approved posts are 1,294, the MoF has only provided a budget for 915 teachers and staff. The tenth Assembly of Mid-Western University, held in May 2021, approved 131 posts. However, that decision has been stalled because the MoF did not provide the budget. Not a single post has been added to MWU after 2017.

The story of Rajarshi Janak University is no different. Out of 102 posts, the government has only allocated a budget for 55 positions. The Agriculture and Forestry University Assembly decided on approximately 1,200 posts, but it is stuck at the Ministry of Finance.