NMA slams writ against its royalty collection rights

KATHMANDU, JUL 28 -

The Nepal Mountaineering Association (NMA) on Monday criticized a writ filed recently at the Supreme Court seeking to cancel its rights to issue climbing permits and collect royalties for 33 Himalayan peaks.

While the government itself handles peaks in the high Himalaya ranging in altitude from 7,000 metres to 8,000 metres, the NMA has been allowed to manage 33 peaks known as trekking peaks. They range in height from 5,587 metres to 6,654 metres.

For the last 42 years, the NMA has been collecting climbing fees from mountaineering expeditions for the peaks which come to Rs70 million annually.

The petitioner Deepak Bikram Mishra has argued that it is unconstitutional to grant permission to an NGO to collect royalties from the Himalayan peaks, and demanded that this privilege be revoked.

Advocate Mishra filed the writ at the Supreme Court challenging the NMA’s right to collect royalty in the first week of July. The Office of the Prime Minister, Ministry of Culture, Tourism and Civil Aviation and the Department of Tourism have been named defendants in the writ.

Faced with the possibility of losing its source of income, the NMA said that if the government removed the peaks from its control, hundreds of workers would be thrown out of their jobs.

“If the NMA loses these peaks, hundreds of people will become unemployed, and it will also affect mountain tourism,” said Santa Bir Lama, first vice-president of the NMA, speaking at an interaction on Monday. He added that the money collected from the

mountaineers was being spent as per the Tourism Ministry’s

guidelines.

The Supreme Court has summoned the petitioner and defendants for a hearing on the case next Sunday. “The court will decide whether to issue an interim order then,” said advocate Harihar Dahal. “If an interim order is issued, it will negatively affect mountain tourism. Issuing an interim order means that the NMA will not be permitted to issue climbing permits,” said Dahal, who is also NMA member.

Dahal has urged the NMA and tourism entrepreneurs to

lobby strongly with the government to insert a provision for collecting royalty or managing peaks in the Tourism Act. “This is the only way to end the controversy permanently.”

Ministry officials said that they had replied in writing to the Attorney General that it could not comment on the case since the issue was sub judice.

The NMA was established on November 1, 1973. It was authorized to collect royalties for 18 peaks following a cabinet decision on January 24, 1978. Satisfied with its performance, the government on September 20, 2002 allotted another 15 peaks to the NMA. It had also put forward a few conditions like allocating 20 percent of the revenues for local development, 10 percent for environment protection and 5 percent for rescue purposes.

Recently, the parliamentary International Relations and Labour Committee had summoned ministry officials and told them that the NMA could not collect government revenue, and that it should be done by the government itself.

Source: The Kathmandu Post