Nepal, June 29 -- With just around two weeks left for the current fiscal year to end, the government has spent only about one-third of the budget allocated for development works, once again exposing Nepal's persistent struggle to implement capital projects on time.

According to the Financial Comptroller General Office, the government had spent only 34.87 percent of the capital budget as of June 27. Out of the Rs 407.88 billion allocated for capital expenditure this fiscal year, only Rs 142.23 billion has been spent. Capital expenditure is generally considered the development budget.

The slow pace of spending reflects a long-standing weakness in Nepal's budget implementation system. The situation is even worse compared to the same perio...