Kathmandu, Feb. 21 -- The government has backed itself into a wall over the delivery of passports as the stocks of existing machine-readable passports is fast depleting. The country is also facing a looming crisis of excise stickers.

After abruptly cancelling a global tender for the printing and supply of 5 million e-passports, the government initiated the government to government move to procure the Security Printing Press from either France or Germany.

The Security Printing Press, once set up, was also expected to print excise duty stickers and postal stickers within the country. As per Excise Duty Regulations, liquor and tobacco manufacturers and importers must paste excise duty stickers on their products to sell them in the market....