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Weekly Internet Poll # 122

Q. One year after the ceasefire, how wouldyou describe the country�s situation?

ing Gyanendra is a publicfelicitation ceremony inNepalganj on Sunday at a

time when student-led protests insupport of republicanism areintensifying across the country.

More than 300 welcome archeshave been put up along the sevenkilometre stretch of road from theairport to the stadium where the kingwill be honoured. Potholes havebeen hastily plugged and roadswidened.

But the mood in Nepalganj issubdued. The Maoist-affiliatedTharuwan Liberation Front has

King Gyanendradefies Maoistthreats to travelto Nepalganj onSundayShowdown

announced a three-day bandhstarting Friday in four districtsadjoining districts. Violence hasrisen: two policemen were killed inexplosions this week and 30 securitypersonnel were injured on theMahendra Highway Wednesday.Security has been stepped up, withchoppers hovering overhead.�Watch us, you will see fromtomorrow how tight security willbe,� Regional Administrator,Rabindra Man Joshi told us. At jointmeetings to coordinate security andpreparations, the main worry is thelow turnout. This is the third officialfelicitation ceremony for KingGyanendra since he ascended the

throne in June 2001, and is part ofthe tradition for a new king. Thefirst two ceremonies were held inBiratnagar and Dhangadi last year.

For locals, this is a time to lielow. �We have learnt not to expectmuch from these official visits,� saida local, Prem Bahadur Malla.

Local NGOs, businesses, officeshave been mobilised. VDCs andDDCs in the outlying areas,including districts in the Maoistaffected areas have set uppreparatory committees to arrangefor people to travel to Nepalganj.

The local leaders of the politicalparties say they will boycott the royalevent. Krishna Man Shrestha of the

Nepali Congress said: �We have notreceived any decision from thecentral committee, but we are notgoing to participate.� The UML�sDeb Raj Bhar said the felicitationceremony was �quite meaningless�,adding: �It is very bad timing. Allthis expense at a time when thecountry is in crisis.� Student unionsaffiliated to the parties are planninga protest program on the same day.

Not everyone is so negative.Purna Lal Chuke, a Nepalganj-based political analyst said: �This isa Maoist-affected region, and maybewhen the king comes here he willfind out for himself how bad thingsare and help us.� l

NETRA KC in NEPALGANJ

WELCOME: One of the 300welcome arches going up inNepalganj to welcome KingGyanendra this weekend.

RUDRA KHADGA

K

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2 6 - 12 FEBRUARY 2004 #182EDITORIAL

editors@nepalitimes.com, www.nepalitimes.com

A

KING AND COUNTRYKing Gyanendra’s handling of the nation’sstate of affairs suggests that he has nodesire to rule the nation for long. As CKLal opines in ‘A king can’t do wrong’(State of the State, #181), the moves bythe royal palace after he assumed thethrone is slowly and gradually pushingthe future of monarchy towards aninevitable downfall. Had our politicalleaders been good enough, the peoplewould have already revolted andreinstated their sovereignty. KingGyanendra has tried to capitalise on theirstupidity, but the people are not foolish.Ultimately, it looks like it will be themonarchy that will pay the price for theking’s actions. It would be in the king’sand the national interest to hand overpower to political parties and force theMaoists to join mainstream politics.

Rameshwor Kafle, email

l As usual, CK Lal in his ‘A king can’tdo wrong’ (#181) reveals the true stateof the state. As the head of the family

holds the responsibility of looking after thefamily even forsaking his personal luxuries,the king must understand his ownresponsibilities and limitations. At a timewhen the country is in economic doldrums,there is no point in seeking Rs 142 millionfrom an almost bankrupt exchequer to buymore cars. When will the king start looking atthe plight of the famine-stricken in westernNepal?

Ashish Sigdel, Bharatpur

l After reading the king’s interview inTime, I was quite impressed and even daredto hope for a better future. But somethingdid not seem right. The king has consistentlyspoken about his concerns for the Nepalipeople but why has there been absolutelynothing to show for it? CK Lal in ‘A king can’tdo wrong’ (#181) made me understand why.I agree with Lal that it was not right for theking to hike the palace allowances andimport the luxury cars at the present time.Perhaps these purchases could beacceptable if the palace coffers were alsobeing engaged in charity, development and

L E T T E R S

relief work. All this does is strengthen thehand of those who think that extrememeasures will solve our country’s deep-rooted problems.

R Khadga, Lazimpat

l It has been almost a year-and-a-halfsince the political parties launched their anti-king demonstrations. Having started todestroy the nation in thepast 12 years, they nowwant to finish the job. TheRoyal Nepali Army and theCIAA should teach theleaders of political parties agood lesson before it’s toolate. The Panchayatisystem used to be a lotbetter than the democracywe have now. Democracyis only for the politiciansbut not for the public.Students, the ‘pillars of thefuture’, are just pawns ofthe narrow-minded politicalleaders. Nepalis should

Ihave been coming to Nepalannually for the last decade inan attempt to improve surgical

services in remote district hospitals.This gives me snapshots to makecomparisons and the mostsignificant one last month was the

construction boom in Kathmandu.As a medical doctor and a

student of population health, I amamazed at how many under-employed doctors there are inKathmandu, as well as how manybrand-new under-utilised diseasepalaces there are that togethertempt the well to become sick.Medical schools and variouscolleges of so-called health sciencesabound to produce even moreresources to treat the worried well.

There are few practitioners inNepal who minister to the sick,but instead there are surgeons whocut, physicians who diagnose,endoscopists who look around,urologists who probe and

The life expectancy in Kathmandu is 30 years more than in Mugu

Diagnosing Nepalneurosurgeons who suck outbrain jelly. The constructionboom in hospitals, nursing homesand research centres ensures thatmedical harm will become aleading cause of death in Nepal,as is the case in developedcountries.

The most troubling discoveryis how little discussion there isabout the conflict here, or anyconsideration of what to doabout it. I found lots ofpublished works on the Maoistconflict, especially documentingits history. Even BaburamBhattarai�s PhD thesis is available.But there is precious little onpotential solutions.

Yes, everyone wants peace.But how are we going to getthere? No one even has a clueabout how to start. Many see theneed for a republic, which locallymeans Nepal no longer having amonarchy, and having somesemblance of democracy. Otherswant a benevolent despot to rulethem. Some fear the army is incontrol of the non-Maoist part ofthe country.

There are signs and stickersadvocating peace. Maybe theywant the exploitation that existedbefore the troubles began tocontinue peacefully. If you don�tknow where your ship is goingthen any port you end up in isfine. Only the students aremarching, but they have noanswers either. They just wantchange. Politics here is almost adirty word, suggesting onlypartisan discussions.

Nepal�s burgeoning media areweapons of mass distraction, asthey cater to prurient youth in asociety that is considerably moresalacious than a decade ago. Benton creating a consumer society,with a service-oriented culture,

the media offer no choices for ahealthy society.

So what kinds of solutionsmight be considered? To beginwith, the massive concentrationof royal wealth is not conduciveto justice. When three of themost luxurious cars in the worldare purchased with public funds,what kind of message does thatsend to Nepalis?

Then perhaps an emergencyneeds to be declared to providebasic needs as enunciated byKing Birendra decades ago. Thefocus of such programs have tobe in Mugu, Bajura and Kalikot,the three least-healthy districts.The average length of life inKathmandu is 30 years morethan in remote Mugu.

Nepal can take cues fromKerala state in India or Sri Lankaand pursue an social-welfare leddevelopment program. Thosehave been incredibly successful inproducing a healthy society,despite a protracted civil war inSri Lanka. Both countries have ahealth status close to America�s.

Discussions on peace mustbegin with vibrant discussion ofthe primordial problem:increasing relative poverty, theastronomical gap between richand poor and what to do aboutthat. Nepal had peace from 1951to 1996, but that wasn�t enough.The guiding principle, should beJohn Rawl�s Theory of Justice inwhich inequalities are limited tothose which benefit the leastadvantaged. Begin by cancelingthe royal order for Rolls Roycesand Jaguars. l

Stephen Bezruchka worked in Nepalbetween 1976 and 1986. He is nowsenior lecturer in the International

Health Program of the School of PublicHealth and Community Medicine at the

University of Washington in Seattle.

stick together and build a new nation. If thesituation stays like this, we will be vulnerableto external intervention. The king should takepower in his hands and help all of us to livesafely. As things stand, that acronym forNepal—Never Ending Peace And Love—doesn’t stand a chance.

Buddhi Pant, email

GUEST COLUMNStephen Bezruchka

MEDIA TYPHOONSt a time when the country is suffering from multiple crises, wedidn’t need the distraction of yet another street fight, one thatpits rival media houses in a knockout tournament. The losers

are Nepali readers who have come to expect much moreprofessionalism than was displayed on the front pages of thenational broadsheets this last week.

We can analyse the dispute on several levels. The first is content:the coverage of this media war was itself an indication of how easilymedia owners dumped journalistic ethics and independence to employtheir column inches shamelessly for a partisan cause. The separationof news and opinion went out the window: inflammatory headlines,provocative intros, incendiary pictures and text was no different thanthe role of the arsonists on the streets. Contrast this with the waythe BBC covered the aftermath of the Hutton Report this week thatsaw the resignation of its director. And let’s not hear any of those‘we are Third World so we can be third rate’ excuses.

Essentially, this is a circulation war gone crazy. One side took theirresponsible step of piggybacking on an ongoing political studentunrest to hurt its rival by igniting jingoism and pseudo-nationalism.Better examples of shooting oneself in the foot are hard to come by,even in this day and age.

So far, we have been fortunate that the unrest did not spread likea bush fire across Nepal’s tinder-dry polity. Even without theexperience of the Hrithik Roshan riots, such tactics would have beentermed rash. But knowing what happened then, it was a decision ofincredible recklessness.

Having said that, one can have a rational debate about the prosand cons of foreign direct investment in media. Some countries haveno problems with it, others feel they need restrictions. But it is clearthat in an age of economic globalisation and satellite media, the daysof national control are numbered.

One can argue that since television’s transboundary footprintputs it beyond national regulation, at least print media should beprotected from foreign ownership. Fair enough. But that is for ourlaw makers to decide,not mobs in patrioticfrenzy over anoutdated wire servicenews item on Lumbini.

Even so, are weso weak andvulnerable that wefeel threatened by acouple of foreignowned newspapers?Canada has taken onand beat the next-doorUS media juggernaut—not by shutting it out,but by being betterand more relevant.The way to beatforeign ownership isto be moreprofessional, morecredible and moreindependent.

KIRAN PANDAY

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o one should be surprised abouthow both sides in the raging mediawar have activated their Dirty Tricks

Depts. Bribing officials or hiring hoodlumsto control the market is standard operatingprocedure in nascent capitalism. Cutthroatprice wars come with the turf. Maligning

Free competition andfree press don�t

always complementeach other

OJHAI would like to applaud Suresh Ojha’sinitiative (‘Silicon Valley to Kathmandu Valley’,#180). Only a handful of Nepalis return toNepal with such a mission. Ojha’s optimismamidst the grim situation that hindersvisionaries like him is admirable. Afterreading his article, it sounds like Ojha hasjust started getting firsthand experiencedealing with Nepal’s bureaucracy that tendsto work against those who plan to help thenation. Nepal always had great engineers.What Nepal lacks are business experts whocan compete in a challenging global IT marketand export IT services of significant scaleand quality.

P Thapa, Maryland, US

NOT YELLOWYubraj Ghimire’s research-type article ‘King’sADC or Singhal’s pawn?’ (#180) is right on.Ghimire bares to us readers the truth thatNepal is moving backwards in every field.

The actions of the king, the behaviour ofthe parties, and even the so called ‘People’sWar’ of the Maoists are no help. In this race

instead of improving content to earnreader loyalty, the mortal combat gotnastier.

And when the anti-THT broadsheetcartel, Nepal Media Society, dragged out adecayed debate about the birthplace ofBuddha into unnecessary controversy, itsimply exposed the intellectual bankruptcyof our media moguls. When you stoop solow, you lick the dirt. The jingoismescalated and the two sides burnt copies ofeach other�s papers on the streets.

A mob pelted stones on APCA Houseon 29 January, hurting one reporter. Mobfury is unpredictable. Had the attack on

THT claimed innocent lives, it wouldhave been impossible to exonerate theNepal Media Society. The media cartelcouldn�t have chosen a worse time toresolve its longstanding rivalry withThe Himalayan Times. The country isin crisis: the insurgency is into itseighth bloody year, the monarchists

are in no mood to relent, main-stream parties are agitating,students are raising republicanslogans. All we need isinternecine warfare in themedia to complete the picture

of total chaos.Kailash Sirohiya,

Jamim Shah, MahendraSherchan and PushkarLal Shrestha must knowthey are playing withfire. They are all too well-informed to claiminnocence if their jingoismhad turned into a repeat ofthe media-instigatedmadness over RhitikRoshan�s non-remarks.

What spooked thesemedia heavyweights at thispoint in time? The rumor intown is that Nepali mediabosses are having sleeplessnights worrying about moreIndian private mediacompetition over the horizon.Several regional conglomerates aresaid to be eyeing the Nepali

media market, lured by advertising growthpotential.

Sahara India, with interests in aviation,trading and finance, is believed to becontemplating a grand entry into Nepalimedia mainly to safeguard its futurebusiness interests here. The fate of the FMand terrestrial television of the KantipurGroup, satellite telecast of Spacetime andprintventuresofKamanapublications would be in double jeopardyif corporate India made a dramatic entry.

Merchants prefer not to incite violence:instability is never in the interest ofbusiness. So, perhaps Nepal�s mediamoguls know something the rest of usdon�t. Otherwise, why dig up an obscuretwo-month-old story that had died anatural death?

The current controversy has also rakedup another issue: can one media house betrusted with the control of print, radio,television and the Internet? The KantipurGroup�s coverage of the presentcontroversy shows exactly why suchmonopoly is dangerous. The same vitrioliccoverage of its rival media comes out of itsFM, television, print and Internet outlets.In normal times, Kantipur would havemade a spectacle of itself by doing all this.But at the time of multiple crises in thecountry, a media monopoly, in cohortwith a cartel that it dominates, couldunleash unimaginable disaster. This iswhere the regulatory role of governmentshould be visible. But it isn�t.

The issue of foreign investment in theNepali media needs to be resolved onceand for all. If we can do without it, let�slegislate against their entry into our holycountry. Television would be forced totake up the Nepal One model of uplinkingfrom India, the print shibboleths will besaved from the competition anddegenerate into a series of Rising Nepals.We have seen free competition and freepress aren�t complementary. The mediacan�t be guided by marketfundamentalism in a country like ours. l

STATE OF THE STATECK Lal

N the competition is accepted practice.So, when The Himalayan Times

(THT) and The Kathmandu Post (TKP)got into a mutually destructive competitionto undercut each other on the newsstandstwo weeks ago, all we could do was hopethat better sense would prevail. Alas,

probably the best indication about how farwe will go to sell our souls for money andprofit. Greed has got the better of oursociety, it has replaced our traditionalspirituality, compassion and respect forfellow living beings. If your reporter’sinvestigation is right, then a whole foodchain of officials, academics and overseaslaboratories will profit from the export ofNepali monkeys to America. The man behindthis plan, Mukesh Chalise, is quoted in yourpaper as saying “Common species should beused for human welfare. There is no harm inexporting monkeys.” That king of reasoningis precisely why this trade is so morallyunconscionable. That we allow a fellowprimate, one reverred by our culture, to betortured and used as a guinea pig in medicalexperiments that will end in a slow andpainful death.

Mina KC, email

BOREDIt has befallen upon this humble reader togive Kunda Dixit an executive criticism of hislatest Under My Hat ‘The Return of the King’

on behalf of all the eager beaver readers.This is to spare him the trouble of havingto sit through another torturous eveningtearing out his hair in exasperation tryingto write something readable. So, withoutfurther ado, let us join Dixit as he sitsthrough unappeasably horrible films abouthobbits and elfs, wizards and Dark Lords,because obviously he is not doing it for hisown pleasure as he considers it his dutyto watch the rotten movie and passcomments in his precious column. Are youstill with me? Right, so Dixit watches themovie even though he himself is bored todeath, and then goes through the horror ofwriting about it, because of course, we’renever going to watch the movie withouthis comments. Then he tries to draw aweak parallel between the movie and thecountry. Anyone can plagiarise and pokefun, but talent and originality like directorPeter Jackson’s, who brings Tolkien backto life after half a century, is rare. Even ifDixit doesn’t like this stuff, he shouldrespect it.

Sewa Bhattarai, email

of backwardness, some ‘Durbarians’ arefanning religious extremism. It is not smartfor a 21th century king’s image to be seenusing religion for legitimacy. And it isespecially not smart to use Indian religiousextremism to shore up support.Fundamentalists have no place in modernNepali society. This is a nation for allNepalis, not for ‘Durbarians’.

Ashok Neupane, email

MONKEYING AROUNDI find it an outrage that the country thatworships the Hanuman is even consideringexporting monkeys (‘Year of the monkeys’,#180) for medical research in the west. It is

4 6 - 12 FEBRUARY 2004 #182NATION

HERE AND THEREDaniel Lak

atariya and Sohanpur in thefertile plains of the Karnali inBardiya district are just a few

kms apart. Villagers in both placeshave suffered and lost relatives inthe conflict. In Satariya, theindigenous Tharu community isgenerally supportive of the Maoists,while in Sohanpur they aren�t.

Driving into Satariya, the localguide gets nervous. �This is Maoistterritory, it is risky, please be carefulwith your questions,� he warns aswe reach the quiet, isolated village.Two hours drive west of Nepalganj,many families here have willinglysent their children to join theMaoists. No coercion, no forcedrecruitment.

Because of this, Satariya hassuffered retribution from thesecurity forces and many Tharushave disappeared. No one suspectedof being a Maoist ever returns afterbeing taken in for questioningaround here. Bardiya has the highestnumber of disappeareds in Nepal.

Parents gather around us withphotographs, some with justnegatives, of their missing sons and

Tale oftwo townsin the taraiThe Tharu struggle to survivewar, impunity and neglect

NARESH NEWAR in BARDIYA

daughters. They plead with us tohelp them trace lost relatives. �Allwe want is to know if they are deador alive,� says 50-year-old DilMaya Tharu. A feeble looking oldman nearby has waited two yearsin vain for his son to come homeafter security forces picked him upfrom his radio repair shop atMotipur. �If my son is dead, I justwant to see his body so I cancremate him, we will be satisfiedwith the truth,� he says.

A teenager, looking cold andindifferent, stands out in thecrowd. He gestures that he wishesto speak privately. Entering anearby house he latches the door.He is silent for a minute, then says:�People here support the Maoistsbut we have to be careful becausethere may be informers,� saysBuddhi Tharu. The 17-year-oldlost his sister, two years older thanhim. �She was unarmed when theyarrested her. Yet the next day,Radio Nepal announced that shewas carrying a gun.� It�s been a yearsince the family saw her. Buddhibelieves she is dead. �If she died,ALL PICS: MIN BAJRACHARYA

S

Parting shots from our columnist before he relocates

Lak leavingt�s sad to leave a place after nearly fouryears. Sadder still, things are so gloomy,hope so distant. It�s frightening that this

country has yet to figure out how it wants tobe governed. My own firmly heldconviction is that most Nepalis would likewhat they were promised after the JanaAndolan in 1990�democracy, democracyand more democracy. But increasingly,they�re lapsing into sullen silence about thechoices on offer, and who can blame them.

It�s simply not true that democracy hasfailed here. The mutterings of those whoprospered under the old Panchayat system

arehollowandunhelpful.

And it�s been clear for months now thatthere can be no return to authoritarianmonarchy. The country is worse off than itwas before 4 October 2002. The king�srecent interview to Time magazine justadded to the air of gloom. The monarchy isin real trouble in Nepal, and those in favourof the institution must do more than hold

public felicitation ceremonies and banrepublican student meetings.

Those who agitate on the streetsagainst the monarchy aren�t exactlyharbingers of hope either. Is it reallyenough just to chant slogans, fight withthe police and organise discussions aboutrepublicanism? No, it�s not. A republicanstate is a tricky thing. Moving from oneform of government to another takespatience, compromise and a clear sense ofwhere one is going. There must be a planthat has the overwhelming support of thepeople whose lives and certainties you wishto change. That isn�t the case right now.

Another reason for gloom is theunforgivable behaviour of mostmainstream media outlets at the moment.Happily, this newspaper and its sisterpublications are excluded. The agitationagainst The Himalayan Times andAnnapurna Post is a risky game that canbackfire against those who play it. If thetwo newspapers are indeed in breach of

the law, they should be prosecuted. But thisis up to the courts, not the publishers ofrival papers, who risk trampling on hardwon press freedoms because they�re worriedabout losing money in a circulation battle.Shame on you all.

The Maoists also depress me. They havelittle new to say and only repeat oldnostrums that haven�t captured the popularimagination in the past. They haveinfluence, even control, over large areas ofthe countryside but they seem moreconcerned with petty authority there thanwith demonstrating their ability togovernment fairly or ably.

Last and least, our dire developmentsector. Nepal�s two most influential donors,Britain and America, now do more tosupport civil war than stop it. Others arecontent to let projects stutter or stopcompletely while writing ever moreconvoluted and pointless reports. Hats off atleast to the European Union for threateningto pull out if things don�t improve here

soon. The best we can hope for isgenerational change. The young people oftoday are going to do a better job, I justknow it. Never trust anyone over 30. l

Daniel Lak is moving to Miami, Florida and will bewriting for the Nepali Times from America.

I

56 - 12 FEBRUARY 2004 #182NATION

The Tharu kamaiyas were supposed to have been liberated from bondedlabour five years ago. They have no desire to join the Maoists, but thekamaiyas are fed up of the frequent harassment by soldiers at theLiberated Kamaiya Camps in Bardiya, Kailali and Dang.

“We freed ourselves, no Maoist or politician ever did anything for us,”says Devi B Tharu, chairman of the Freed Kamaiya ManagementCommittee in Shantinagar along the Bardiya highway. He runs a slate-making factory to support his family. “I no longer have to worry what time towake up and I can go anywhere I please,” says Devi of his family’s new-found freedom.

But not all kamaiyas are as fortunate. The land they were granted bythe government is not enough to grow food on. Many kamaiyas say thatthey were better off working for their landlords. “I had no problem workingunder my jamindar. There is more hardship, but today we don’t even haveenough to eat,” says Lahani Tharu, a 25-year-old ex-kamaiya whosejamindar was forced to let her go because of government penalties.

Two years ago, Sita Tharu’s husband was dragged away by the securityforces who accused him of being a Maoist. He never came back and Sita islooking after her five children by herself. Sita says freedom has made hercommunity more vulnerable to harassment by the Maoists and the army.

“I’d rather not have my freedom,” she says. “Who will help me to bringup my children, feed and educate them?” Her 15-year-old daughter is nowforced to go back to working as a kamaiya to feed her mother and siblings.She sends them money and clothes from her landlord’s house.

then she is a martyr who sacrificedher life for a good cause,� he adds.

Buddhi is confident theMaoists will win the war. �If theycan achieve so much in just eightyears, imagine the impact of therevolution in another 20,� he says.Several members of his family areeither sympathisers or activemembers of the Maoist party. Hisuncle was recently shot by securityforces while at a Maoist culturalprogram. Two cousin sisters whojoined the Maoists as militants havealso disappeared. The family is notsure whether they are still alive.

Buddhi�s family and otherTharus here were easy recruits forthe Maoists. The formerly landlessvillagers are now in charge and ownbig tracts of farms redistributedequally among the mostimpoverished families. �Thejamindars don�t even dare look intoour eyes,� says Buddhi. �They usedto own the whole village and gaveus only a small share of the cropthat we cultivated.�

The landlords have abandonedtheir farms and now live inNepalganj. Most have no savingsleft. The Tharus who are still loyalto their jamindar masters arethreatened by the Maoists not tovisit them or give them a share ofthe harvests.

Fear, not supportDown the highway in Sohanpurit is a different story. Here, theTharus don�t want to be associatedwith the Maoists at all. The deathof so many of their people has beentoo heavy a price for thecommunity. Despite the arrestsand disappearance of at least sixpeople in their village at the handsof the army, they do not supportthe rebels.

But this doesn�t mean theysupport the security forces either.They fear them more than therebels because the army patrolsarrest innocent villagers and accusethem of being Maoists. �When thesoldiers come here, they make a listof Maoists based on informationgiven by our own people. Thereis no Maoist in our village,� says22-year-old Ram Prasad Tharu,whose father was disappeared bythe security forces. �He was asimple hardworking farmer andnot into politics at all.� His familywent to the Chisapani ArmyBarracks, but was told his fatherwasn�t there. They never foundhim.

Tharus in this village still owntheir land and most of the youthgo to school and colleges and helptheir parents on the farms. �All we

want is peace and to be left alone,�says 23-year-old Rosan Chaudharywho, along with other youngTharus, runs a community forestryuser group that helps generateincome for the villagers from theforest products.

�We don�t need this war. Wehave no expectations from theMaoists,� says Rosan, who doesn�tbelieve that the Maoists are reallyfighting for the Tharu. �Thegovernment can do a lot bybringing education anddevelopment programs so ouryoung people get an educationand will not be lured by theMaoists,� adds Rosan. �We are nolonger naïve, we know what isgood for us.� Despite thedisappearance of his father, he hasno intention of supporting therebels.

The army now seems to belearning its lesson and doesn�t treatevery Tharu as a potential Maoist.Ekaraj Tharu, a radio journalistwho broadcasts an educationalprogram in Banke, has beenmotivating his community to goto school. Not a single Tharu has agovernment job here and he thinksonly education will change things.�We have never been treatedequally,� he says. �And now we arein the frontlines facing the bulletsand dying like dogs.�l

Names of some of the people quotedin this article have been altered.

�No Maoist or politiciandid anything for us.�

From l-r: Father showing a picture of his disappeared son, heavysecurity checks along the Bardia highway, Tharu villagers inSohanpur anticipating a crackdown by security forces anytimesoon, Liberated Kamaiya Shelter.

6 6 - 12 FEBRUARY 2004 #182NEPAL IN THE FOREIGN PRESS

ith hopes receding for an earlyceasefire, pressure is building up forthe government to at least sign a draft

accord on human rights so that more innocentlives are not lost and the conflict is conductedaccording to international humanitariannorms.

Nepal�s international donors, humanrights organisations and domestic civil societyare lobbying hard to convince the army that itis in its own interest to sign the accord andremedy the bad press it has been getting fordisappearances, extra-judicial killings anddeaths of civilians.

They argue that the draft accord preparedby the National Human Rights Commissiondoesn�t contain anything that Nepal hasn�talready ratified in various key internationaltreaties. For its part, the army has been tryingto clean up its act, announcing last week thatit had jailed and discharged 25 soldiers,including a major, after investigations of seriousrights violations. At another press meet onThursday, Liz Rowsell of the AmnestyInternational team, which completedinspections in several districts last week, urgedboth the army and the Maoists to sign theaccord. She told us: �The situation is extremelygrave in Nepal. It is almost certain to becomea catastrophe unless the internationalcommunity, the government, civil society andothers take action now.�(See interview above.)

French ambassador to Nepal, ClaudeAmbrosini who is looking after the interests ofthe current European President, Ireland, metthe prime minister on Monday with other EUambassadors, urging greater attention tohuman rights and brought up the subject ofsigning the accord. But officials told us thearmy was still not completely convinced, andsigning now could undermine morale in thefield and be seen as an admission of guilt.

To sign or not to sign ?

�Sign the human rights accord�Nepali Times: How bad is it?Elizabeth Rowsell: This time we went to Nuwakot,Kabhre, Sarlahi and Dhanusha to investigate reportsof extra judicial killings, disappearances and abuseby the Maoists. We found substantive evidence ofalleged extra judicial killings by the security forcestoo. We are extremely concerned, that on the face ofthe evidence, a policy of the army to kill suspectedMaoists seems to be emerging.

But aren’t the Maoists also doing it?Yes. We investigated reports of killings by theMaoists, including one GTZ worker in Dailekh,reportedly because she was an informant andanother woman because she had a brother in thearmy. The Maoists still appear to be targetingcivilians and non-combatants and indulging inhuman rights violations such as extortion,abductions and executions.

Which side is more guilty?We don’t make comparisons, it’s not about whocommits more human rights violations. The situation

Donor pressure has been growing eversince they grudgingly agreed to a $70 millionWorld Bank budget support in November.The EU statement this week warned of seriousconsequences for development assistance if Ne-pal�s parliamentary crisis dragged on.

Activists say the Maoists indicated duringthe ceasefire last year that they were willing tosign the human rights accord. Rebel leaderPrachanda, in a surprisingly soft statement onThursday, welcomed the EU�s call for aceasefire and a negotiated settlement. He reit-erated his group�s acceptance of any UN me-diation or facilitation towards that end.

Human rights activists have urged the

government to convince the army that it hasto seize the initiative and sign the accord firstsince and gain the moral high ground. Thearmy needs to clean up its tarnishedinternational image, which activists say couldimpact on future UN peacekeeping duties.

The army argues that donors and humanrights groups are putting disproportionatepressure on the forces for violations, and sayMaoist atrocities don�t come under as muchscrutiny. �We know what we have to do, weare sensitive to human rights, but thesecriticisms are theoretical. We are fighting aguerrilla war, the ground reality is different,�said one senior military source.

Signing the Human Rights Accord would be good PR for the government

Amnesty International�s two-member team has just visited four districtsto look at the human rights situation. One of the members, ElizabethRowsell, shared her field experiences with Nepali Times.

Even so, human rights activists say thatas the legitimate state party, it is the duty ofthe army to be more responsible than therebels. One diplomat told us: �If the Maoistssigned first, it would be a PR disaster for thegovernment.�

Under the accord, there would bemonitoring teams in the field that can bequickly deployed to conduct on-the-spotinvestigation of incidents. It could minimisedistortions and inaccurate field reports as wellas protect citizens from harm. And whenthe peace talks do restart, it will help in con-fidence-building and safeguarding theceasefire. l

KUNDA DIXIT

W

is extremely grave in Nepal. It is almost certain tobecome a catastrophe unless the internationalcommunity, the government, civil authority andothers take action now. We urge both sides ofthis conflict to sign the human rights accord.

What if the army refuses?The international community has to urge thegovernment to sign the human rights accord assoon as possible, even unilaterally. There havebeen over 200 disappearances in the countrysince the end of the ceasefire in August 2003.But when families go to the Supreme Court to tryand lodge habeas corpus petitions, theauthorities deny arrest. Instructions must beissued about the rules of engagement. Shootingpeople dead who are suspected to be Maoistsand not first arresting and charging them withrecognisable crimes must be stoppedimmediately. Security forces must behave in linewith the constitution of Nepal and ultimately withall the international standards to which Nepal isa state party.

IN THE CROSSFIRE: A woman from Dang being treated for bullet wounds at Bheri Zone Hospital in Nepalganj.MIN BAJRACHARYA

KIRAN PANDAY

76 - 12 FEBRUARY 2004 #182NATION

illowing black smoke fromburning tyres on the streetsthis week joined with smoke

from burning copies of TheHimlayan Times and AnnapurnaPost over Kathmandu�s streets. Thetyres symbolised protest against�regression�, while burningnewspapers apparently financed byIndian investors seem to augur thebeginning of a �swadeshi� movement.

Foreign direct investment in theNepali media is a crucial issue withwide ramifications. To be sure, theentry of the two newspapers in theNepali media market was notstraightforward. While thegovernment�s declared policydoesn�t exactly welcome foreigninvestment in media, successive pastgovernments have chosen not toenact laws against it. This has left aloophole for any foreign group withprofessional or other interest toenter the Nepali media market.Certainly, the investment of TheHimalayan Times (THT) andAnnapurna Post (AP) and the role oflocal partners are not a hundredpercent kosher. But the Group ofFour who form the Nepal MediaSociety need to be pulled up fortheir brutal attack and boycott callagainst their rivals.

THT was launched two yearsago. So why this protest now? Aweek before the ugly street scenesbegan, The Kathmandu Post (KP)joined the price war against THT byslashing its price to Rs 1.50 from Rs4. While The Kathmandu Post fellinto the trap laid by THT, its actiontriggered fear among fellow membersin the Nepal Media Society of unfaircompetition which may drive themto extinction.

This is not a healthy mediatrend. In fact, gross distortion in thecoverage of the media war itself inthe newspapers of both camps haveshown that the casualty is theprofessionalism that was evolving inthe media sector in the past fewyears. Even the statement made bythe prime minister and thegovernment spokesman on the issuewere selectively quoted bynewspapers of the two sidesdepending on their allegiance.

The issue of foreign invesment inthe media therefore merits an urgentdebate followed by the formulationof a clear policy. Such rules shouldbe guided by longterm nationalinterest, but also allow healthycompetition that will enahance pressfreedom and benefit the readers. Ifthe THT or AP should beinvestigated at all, it should be onreasonable evidence of having madethe investment illegally. That can bedone with a petition before theSupreme Court by the aggrievedparty, or the setting up of a judicial

Journalism vs vandalismprobe by the government.

The Nepal Media Society shouldbe seeking due process, not duressthrough street protests. In fact thesociety should be at the forefront ofdecrying violence instead ofinstigating it. By taking to thestreets, the society has shown that itdoesn�t believe in the rule of law.What next: stoning of each other�soffices? And what if the streetprotests escalate out of control?

The CIAA also has a role intriggering the backlash against THTand its publishers, the Asia-PacificCommunications Association

Gross distortion in the coverage of the media warby newspapers on both sides is itself an indication

that the casualty has been journalistic professionalism

B

(APCA). If it is showing so mucheagerness to pursue the case ofKantipur�s TV license and thedetention of its managing director, itshould also investigate the allegedirregularity in the APCA investment.All the CIAA did was write to thegovernment to come out with aclearcut policy on foreign directinvestment in the media. Is thatreally the CIAA�s job?

Whether it is the CIAA or themedia, exceeding the limits ofauthority is counterproductive. It iswhat has brought us to this sorrystate. l

CAPITAL LETTERYubaraj Ghimire

8 6 - 12 FEBRUARY 2004 #182

Nepal will not benefit unless it is prepared for regional free tradeWhat after SAFTA?

KHADGA SINGH

hen the SAARC heads of statemet in New Delhi in 1995,they signed a charter that

(among other things) promised toeradicate poverty from the region by2002. One-fourth of the world�s poorstill live in South Asia.

Compared to such wishfulthinking, the South Asian Free TradeArea (SAFTA) plan may be lessambitious, and therefore more likelyto succeed. But if Nepal isn�t preparedfor free trade, it won�t benefit from it.If we couldn�t even act on the benefitsof the 1995 South Asian PreferentialTrade Arrangement (SAPTA) that wassupposed to boost intra-regional tradeon a commodity-wise basis, it is unlikelywe will take any advantage fromSAFTA.

Economists supported the SAPTAidea, but consumers and traders did notsee any discernible changes. �The goodnews was that SAPTA came aboutearlier than expected,� says RajendraKhetan, the president of the NepalBritain Chamber of Commerce andIndustry. �The bad news is that thenegotiations among member countriesfor tariff concessions went pretty slow.�

In the last nine years, barely 5,000items were tagged with concessions inan entire region of 1.5 billion people.And even after the agreement to lower

no research in this regard,� says HastaDabadi, Executive Director at theFNCCI. �Without such a study, we arenot in a position to say if we will benefitor lose from SAFTA. Such studies requiremassive investments which we can�tafford.�

But it doesn�t take a rocket scientistto figure out that landlocked Nepal�sexports face a logistical problem,especially when it comes to exportingto a third country via India. Transit andtransportation time inflates the price ofgoods that are usually available in SouthAsian countries at a much cheaper price.�There are problems with transit andtransportation,� says economistBishwambar Pyakurel. �These add upthe cost of our exports and minimiseour comparative advantage.�

India is Nepal�s biggest tradingpartner to which we export around Rs30 billion worth of goods annually. Thiscould have reached saturation sinceIndia produced just about everythingNepal makes, and given its economiesof scale, would find it expensive toimport Nepali products. In such asituation, even if India lowers its tariffsfor Nepali goods under the SAFTAprovision, Nepalis would not be able tocompete with Indian manufacturers.

What is true for India could applyto other South Asian markets. UnderSAFTA, if the tariffs are brought downto zero in all SAARC nations, it will be

tariffs for the import of these goods bymember countries, no deals were struckbecause some SAARC membercountries had not done theirhomework. Those who did, discoveredthey could play by easier bilateral rules,and didn�t need to get bogged down ina regional framework.

If SAPTA was a disaster, canSAFTA be any better? SAFTA plans toboost the present five percent intra-SAARC trade by phasing out tariffbarriers and quota restrictions for goodsbetween member countries over a 10-year period. The clock will start tickingfor Nepal, Bhutan and the Maldives toreduce their tariff rates to zero to fivepercent between 2006-2016. India,Pakistan and Bangladesh will get fiveyears to implement the new tariffregime. Sri Lanka will have six years.

Nepal may well bring tariff barriersdown because it has already signed thedraft SAFTA agreement. The sameapplies to other SAARC members. Onpaper, the idea looks lucrative. Withtariff rates at zero by 2016, SouthAsia�home to one-fourth ofhumankind�will indeed be a hugemarket for member states.Theoretically, everyone stands to gain.But practically, countries will only gainif they are prepared.

Nepali officials still haven�t figuredout which commodities will beadvantageous to us. �There has been

uch can happen in two weeks.The Saturday after thiscolumn covered the

beginning of the newspaper war, TheHimalayan Times (THT) respondedto The Kathmandu Post’s price-cuts,and reduced its price by 50 percentto Rs 1. This marked a further victoryfor readers and advertisers of bothnewspapers. But THT’s move turnedout to be the last straw for the NepalMedia Society (NMS), a tradegroup of private-sectorNepali-owned newspaperpublishers, and it swunginto action. Not in acompetitive, business-likeway, but in a raw, crude,emotionally-laced cry-babymantra of nationalism.

Through full-page ads,it attempted to turn peopleagainst THT and its sisterpublication Annapurna Post(AP) about a wire servicenews item that THT hadpublished last Novemberabout the proceedings of aconference in India. A fewdays later, it changed its tactics andstarted to assert that foreigners(translation: Indians) should not beallowed to invest in the “sensitive”Nepali print-media. That doing sowould pose a threat to Nepal’ssovereignty, and, as the TKP editorPrateek Pradhan (who earned adegree in journalism in New York)put it, would lead to the‘Sikkimisation of Nepal’.

Before 1991, there were only twobroadsheet dailies: Gorkhapatraand The Rising Nepal and the stateran them as it still does. Now thereare more than 12 broadsheets, allrun by private money which hasbeen invested in attracting talented

Indian products that will flood thatmarket not Nepali products. Therehave been exceptions like Nepal�s ghiuand noodles, but with SAFTA inplace, regional economic giants couldcut into Nepal�s comparativeadvantage.

Nepal must have a strategy if it isto benefit from SAFTA. If not, we�lllose out regionally and in the domesticmarket too. Lowered tariffs forimported products will mean regionalforeign goods will inundate themarket. If those products are betterquality and cheaper, they will wipeout domestic production. �In such ascenario, the country will face a lose-lose situation,� says Pyakurel. �Localproducers will suffer loss because of adecline in export and sales. Thegovernment will also start losing

revenue.�But there will be one winner: the

Nepali consumer. And if that canhappen here, it can also happen in otherSouth Asian countries. Nepaliproducers must sharpen theircompetitive edge, not just because ofSAFTA but also because of WTO.�WTO and SAFTA will complementeach other,� says Prachanda ManShrestha, Joint Secretary at theMinistry of Industry, Commerce andSupplies. �That is why the trade rulesand regulations we are changing willhelp us cope with the situation.�

If the opportunities presented byWTO are the same as SAFTA but on abigger scale, then the risks will also bebigger. This means Nepal has to gaugeand calculate how we can takeadvantage. l

journalists, to upgrade printingtechnology, and to market anddistribute newspapers. Good Nepalijournalists today enjoy greater jobmobility.

Readers also have a widerchoice and advertisers have a pick.Newspapers have competed with oneanother and with other forms ofmedia for subscribers’ fees andadvertising rupees,

and mosthave done well. Indeed, the Nepaliprint media sector is growing likeany other commercially drivenindustry. All these are positiveachievements that should helpbuild the self-confidence of thosewho run newspapers in Nepal.

Against this backdrop, theargument that print-media sector istoo ‘sensitive for national interests’to allow foreigners to put theirmoney in is a convenient piece offiction. It is propped up to safeguardthe narrow interests of the NMSbyaparis, who, doubting their ownabilities, worry that foreigners mightjust run newspapers well and givebetter value to readers andadvertisers, thereby decreasing their

share of the advertisement pie.Since they cannot share this

worry publicly, they have to have itwear the daura-suruwal ofnationalism. Nice trick, but printmedia is no more sensitive tonational interests than, say, buildinghydropower dams or runningtrainings of Nepali journalists paid

by foreign funds. Saying thatforeign investment in print-media is detrimental to Nepal’ssovereignty is an insult to theintelligence of Nepali readers.It also misleads others as tohow the ad market works.

As Pratyoush Onta arguedin this paper two years agowhen THT first appeared onthe scene, no commercially-run newspaper, no matterhow well funded, can hopedo well in any market byoffending local sensibilities(see: ‘What to do when bigbrother knocks’, #55). The

logic of the ad market,therefore, acts as an in-builtdeterrent against any newspaperissuing outrageous claims. Thatmeans, if anything, both THT andAP have no choice but to be moreNepali than other newspaper.Meantime, we can rest assured thatjust as Nepali society’s ijjat does notdepend up on what Miss Nepalwears, Nepal’s sovereignty too doesnot depend what the what the ownersof private-sector newspapers say toprotect their own interests.

As for the argument allowingforeigners run print-media wouldlead to the ‘Sikkimisation of Nepal’,all one can say that the goodeditors seems to have too little faithin his compatriots to make decisionsfor themselves. l

Private media reacts to competitionwith a cry-baby mantra of nationalism

Media is the messageSTRICTLY BUSINESS

Ashutosh Tiwari

W

M

SUBHAS RAI

96 - 12 FEBRUARY 2004 #182NATION

ing Gyanendra used the word �people� 25 times in the full text ofthe 2,300-word interview that appeared on the online version ofthe Time magazine last week. The thrust of the interview was

contained in one sentence: �Stop saying �me�. Say �us.� Stop saying �party�.Say �people�.�

He concludes the interview by saying: �If the people are happy, theking is happy. And my fear is that we might be heading for a ditch if thepeople, their grievances and their betterment are not thought of. I put

myself in their shoes every night.�The interview probably leaves a

positive impression on a reader notclosely following Nepali politics. But

for those of us involved in researching and analysing the Nepali politicalscene, it does not appear any different from what the Kangresis, Emales,Maoists and others have been saying. In short, the king is sounding like apolitician.

King Gyanendra reiterates his desire to play a �constructive role�. Itmay now be time for us to evaluate whether his role so far has beenconstructive or not. Independent commentators and scholars, withinNepal and outside, will do that, and history will judge if their assessmentis correct.

But the real question iswhether politics is the arenafor a constitutional monarchto play a constructive role.Can a king address thesuffering of the Nepalipeople by playing politics? Ispolitics the way to serve andspeak on their behalf?

A constitutional king�srole is to address the concernsof the people by being non-political, or by rising abovepolitics. Not to be draggedinto day-to-day controversy,but to remain above it. Letthe politicians deal withpolitics, the monarch�s roleshould be to be a role modelfor development, to set newstandards for charity andrelief that others can follow.

Adding luxury cars to thepalace�s fleet of limousinessends the wrong message atthe wrong time. Approving ahigher budget for the royalhousehold when hundredsof thousands of Nepalis are

grieving is inappropriate. An ideal move for King Gyanendra at thepresent time would be to set up a charitable trust in his brother�s nameand in memory of relatives slain on 1 June 2001, financed by their assets.But who is going to tell the king?

Royals in other countries have set examples by being patrons ofcharitable institutions and development causes. In a country devastatedby war, with hundreds of thousands internally displaced, thousandsorphaned and bereaved, such a royal role is even more urgently required.Once such an initiative is launched, there will be no shortage ofphilanthropists and charities inside and outside Nepal who will pour incounterpart funds for relief to support such a pious cause started by noneother than the monarch himself.

Britain is a country which members of Nepal�s royal family visit everyyear. It must have come to their notice that in Britain the members of theroyal family raise hundreds of millions of pounds for charitable causes tomake up for what the state spends on them. We in Nepal should have afoundation modeled on the �Prince�s Trust� which raises money forcharitable causes that bring immediate relief to the disadvantaged.

By all accounts, King Gyanendra is an intelligent man. Butintelligence may not be enough to change the course of history andredefine the role of the 21st century monarch as he wants to do.

That needs wisdom, statesmanship, social commitment and sincerity.A lot of it is also about perception, and the public�s perception should

be of a monarch who is above rhetoric, who is not just playing politics.Our politicians have done that for too long.

The king and his family need to be involved in activities that directlybenefit the people, and for once really put themselves in the people�sshoes. l

Robin Raj is a London-based researcher.

Royal roleepal is not just rich inhydropower, it also has bigdeposits of oil and gas.

Theoretically, the Nepal tarai is a vastrepository of subterraneanhydrocarbon. But arcane tax laws andlack of political will have hinderedprospecting.

Experts at the Department ofMines and Geology say the northernpart of the Ganga Basin has idealgeomorphological conditions for oildeposits similar to the ones found inAssam. The presence of gas seeps inMuktinath and along the Himalayanmidhills also prove that there issomething down there. Analysis of rocksamples from Dailekh and Dangstrongly indicate the presence ofpetroleum. Indian test drills in theGanga plains south of the border havealso shown positive traces ofhydrocarbon deposits.

“There is oil in Nepal, and wehave had oil prospecting contracts, butthere have been all kinds ofbureauractic hurdles in getting the oilout,” explains Bharat Mani Gyawali,chief of the Petroleum ExplorationPromotion Project.

The tarai and Siwalik alongNepal’s southern border have beendivided into 10 exploration blocks of5,000 sq km each. In 1989-90 ShellNepal BV carried out test drilling inBlock 10, including geochemicalanalysis of seep samples. Thecompany also carried out a gravity andseismic survey to map out possibledeposit sites. However, an exploratorywell turned out to be dry.

LONDON EYERobin Raj

tally with laws in neighbouringcountries.

Gyawali asks testily: “The successrate in oil prospecting is 10 percent,there is a huge risk factor. How can lawmakers treat oil in the same way asnoodles?” The Income Tax Law 2058has defined a strict timeframe torecover the capital cost of exploration,which is not the case in India wherethe prospectors are not required to paytaxes during the recovery period.

The legislation further proposesa 10 percent repatriation tax with 30percent income tax and a 100 percentbank guarantee. But the Ministry ofFinance is said to be reluctant tobudge.

Cairn has written to the departmentsaying that unless the laws arechanged it doesn’t see any viabilityprospecting for oil and gas in Nepaland has decided to pull out. “Our laws,red tape and the bureaucratic hoopsthat we make foreign investors jumpthrough are the biggest deterrent topotential investors,” says Gyawali. “Ourdemand for oil is growing, there arerefineries right across the border fromNepal. We must have a strategy andget moving.” l

SUNIL POKHREL

Tarai crude

Gyawali says several other oilcompanies had shown an interest inprospecting. In fact, France’s CGGcarried out aeromagnetic and seismicreflection surveys along the tarai.During the Indian blockade in 1989-90, Panchayat leaders made somepolitical capital out of sloganeeringthat Nepal should find its own oil. Butofficials say political leaders havenever been really serious aboutlooking for it. “We are so mesmerisedby hydropower, that we only paid lipservice to oil and gas,” admitted oneofficial.

The government finally called forinternational bids and in 1997 the US-based Texana Resources proposed toexplore Block 3 in Nepalganj andBlock 5 in Chitwan. By that time, theMaoist insurgency was alreadycreating problems and Texana backedout, using the force majeure clause.The company couldn’t get hold of theexplosives required to create theartificial seismic waves to test fordeposits, official say.

The Department of Mines andGeology then held talks with CairnEnergy PLC which has experienceprospecting in South Asia, and thegroup agreed to resume explorationwork. But Cairn is said to be unhappyabout Nepali tax laws which do not

The king and the people need each other

NKRed tape snarls

explorationfor oil and gas in

Nepal

10 6 - 12 FEBRUARY 2004 #182CONSERVATION

Identity crisis

building�s owner, is part of a newgeneration of house-owners at theforefront of a Newari architecturalrenaissance in Patan. But instead ofbeing praised for his effort, he isgetting criticism fromconservationists who say it disturbsthe harmony of the old town.

Purists don�t like the ethnic chic that goes with modern architectural restoration in Patan

sustaining so we don�t have todepend on donations fromguthiyars,� he told us. �Peopleshould be glad that we didn�tmake it like a concrete box, we aretrue to our traditions.�

Patan Mayor Buddhi RajBajracharya admits that some guthibuildings in his historic town arebeing demolished and the newstructures are not rebuilt accordingto traditional designs ordimensions. But he adds: �Weappreciate the collective effort oflocals in Patan to preserve theirtraditional architecture, and wedon�t want to discourage that.�

In Chyasal Tole, 300-year-oldTadaun Chapal guthi buildingsbelonging to the Byanjakar Samajwere demolished three years agoand the traditional mud andmortar buildings were replacedwith modern structures. Thereconstruction and designs wereoverseen by the German-aidedUrban Development throughLocal Effort (UDLE) project.

Many guthiyars donatedmoney for thereconstruction, and localscontributed voluntarylabour.

The chairman of theChyasal Tile SudharSamiti, Govinda ManByanjakar justifies therestoration: �The previous

MUDITA BAJRACHARYA

BEFORE AND AFTER: Two wings of the Chadaun Chapal Chhen in Chyasal Tole in Patan before and after restoration in 2001.

HOW ORIGINAL? This five-storey guthi building at Chapal Chhen at Chhaya Bahalreplaced a two-storey original, and the chairman of Ward 21, Babu Lal Maharjan (inset)

t a time when the city coresof the Valley�s town are seeinga revival of traditional

architecture, some heritageconservationists are worried that newrestoration techniques are not trueto the original building designs.

In the centre of Patan, a 400-year-old street front building wastorn down recently. It wasn�treplaced with a modern glass andconcrete block, but a modernfive-story apartment with a brickfaçade, tile brick roof, traditionalcarved windows and doors.Krishna Maharjan, the

tear it down. In its place today is afive-storey building with a concreteskeleton and a traditional brick andtile façade. The guthi rents the floorsout to businesses, shops andfunctions to finance its festivals andother pujas.

Guthi member BabulalMaharjan brushes aside criticismthat his new building is not inharmony with the city�s old heart.�We have rebuilt it independentlyin a traditional style, and it is part ofour effort to make the guthi self-

It is an age-old debate betweenhow much compromise is too muchin the struggle between heritageconservation and modern living.Should we be thankful that there isat least some respect for the past, oraim for a purity of form that maynever be attainable?

Chapal Chhen at Chhaya Bahalwas a 300-year-old guthi buildingin Patan in which the Jyapu Samajconducted rituals and bhoj. Thetwo-storey structure was falling apartand in 1999, the guthi decided to

A

ALL PICS: MUDITA BAJRACHARYA

116 - 12 FEBRUARY 2004 #182CONSERVATION

planners and architects are thankfulthat there is at least some sensitivityto the past, even if it is not 100percent pure.

Heritage conservations need tobalance the outside look with thechanging lifestyles of house-ownersand their need for modern interiorswith higher ceilings, more light,more ventilation and betterinsulation against noise and heat.

Increasing economic pressureand the fragmentation of jointfamilies have resulted in the verticalsubdivision of houses, damagingtheir original character. In theabsence of technical supervision,municipal oversight and the lack ofsubsidies for conservation, moreand more houses are reconstructedrather than renovated.

Dilendra Raj Shrestha of ThirdWorld Guest House in Patan hasrenovated his neo-classical house,and says: �We must prioritisehouses according to period and stateof dilapidation and have a clearvision about what is realisticallyachievable.� Shrestha has overseenthe renovation of an old guthi housewith help from UNESCO into abed and breakfast pension in Patanthat is true to the town�s historicalheritage. In future, this could be asustainable model for income fromheritage tourism to finance morerestoration. At present, Patan�sbylaws encourage the adoption of�traditional Nepali style� but fail toexplain what these are.

The overlapping responsibilitiesof the municipality, Department of

Archaelogy, the Town DevelopmentCommittee and the priorities ofvarious donor-assisted projects haveclashed in Patan, creating confusion.There is resistance to takeresponsibility and many urbanhouse-owners simply use loopholesin the law to rebuild without anythought to conservation.

There is an added consideration:which historical period shouldrestoration be true to? In restoringthe Patan Durbar Square, forinstance, does one go back to thepre-1934 earthquake, or restore thetemples and buildings to thesouthern-European styles adoptedby the Ranas with stucco windowborders and venetian blinds? Purists

structure was weak and used upa lot of space, we have changedthe interior while keeping theexterior character of thebuildings,� he said. Indeed, therehas been an effort to conserve theoriginal brick masonry and retainthe essence of Newariarchitecture in Chyasal.

But Jharana Joshi, aconservation officer with theUrban Management andEconomic Diversification Project(UMEDP) doesn�t agree. �It is agreat loss to replace the TadaunChapal with a drasticallydifferent structure, it has alteredthe architectural history of theplace.�

In this tug-o�-war betweenconservation and modernarchitectural preservation, it ishard to say when the thresholdof genuine heritage restorationhas been crossed. And at a timewhen there is so muchdestruction going on, most town

scoff at Austrian architects whorestored the eastern wing of thePatan Museum with visible steelbeams to make the structureearthquake proof.

For Jharana Joshi atUMEDP, a model for truerestoration should be like therebuilding of the Ward 8building. It is true to the originalproportions, using the same localmaterials so that conservationdoes not become a caricature ofthe building that it replaced.Indeed, the Ward 8 buildingwith the vegetation on its roof isan exact replica of the two-storeyhouse it replaced, and is dwarfedby hideous concrete apartment

blocks adjacent to it.Joshi says traditional houses

have their drawbacks: they are dark,damp, have low ceilings and leakyroofs. But many of these can beaddressed with glass windows,damp-proof foundations andwater-resistant roof tiles. �Inaddition, we can take advantageof the insulation properties of thethick walls with mud and mortarconstruction,� she adds.

Ward 8 chairman, PremMaharjan is happy with hisbuilding. �We nearly went for acement building, because wethought it would be more durable,but decided on the brick face andtraditional elements so that wecould set an example for othersabout our heritage.� l

Jharana Joshi,conservation officer at UMEDP

GOOD AS NEW: The restored Ward 8 building and ward chairman, Prem Maharjan (inset)

12 INTERNATIONAL YEAR OF RICE 2004

ice production is arguably the most importanteconomic activity on the planet. And, for those whoyawn and ask what an international year tag can

achieve, it may be useful to go back to 1966, which FAOdeclared International Rice Year. That was also the year theGreen Revolution started sweeping across Asia, the great leapforward in rice that built the foundation of food security andrural stability that Asia needed for its subsequent economicdevelopment.

So will the currentInternational Year of Ricehelp give birth to anotherrevolution in Asia�s rural

areas? 2004 will see Asia awash with rice festivals, rice confer-ences and rice workshops, allowing this simple grain to attractthe attention of the media, politicians, government officials andhundreds of public and civil organisations.

Perhaps 2004 will be the year when the people of Asiarealise that we share one common value or belief: a deepappreciation of rice. More than politics, religion or culture, riceis the one thing that truly defines Asia, and there is no doubtthat the food that defines the region is already undergoing somerevolutionary changes.

No one can sustain economic development without findinga way to lift rice farmers out of poverty. This is an especiallycrucial challenge for the world�s two most populous nations:China and India, and the country with the largest Muslimpopulation, Indonesia.

There are other revolutionary changes and challenges:l The sequencing of the rice genome. Some scientificexperts called the sequencing of the rice genome moreimportant for mankind than the sequencing of the humangenome. Much of this knowledge looks like it will be in thepublic domain and so available for researchers throughout thedeveloping world to use without the restrictions imposed byprivate ownership.l Ownership. For generations, farmers freely shared

We arewhat we eat

varieties. As the science of plant breeding developed, countries,organisations, institutes and even some private companies alsoshared their varieties. Countries all over Asia have introducedplant variety rights legislation to protect their biological assetsand, as part of this process, laid claim to the rice varieties theycan justifiably call theirs.l Nutrition. While most people prefer rice polished white,a small but growing minority like it brown. In its white form,the grain lacks micronutrients essential to human health. Mostrice consumers get these micronutrients from dishes they eatwith rice, rather than from rice itself. Poor rice consumers,who can�t always afford the meat and vegetables they shouldhave with their rice, often suffer from poor nutrition. Scientistsare now working on developing rice varieties that are high iniron and vitamin A, the developing world�s two worst dietarydeficiencies.l Water. Using traditional irrigation methods, producingone kg of rice can take up to 4,000 litres of water. Today, halfof Asia�s developed freshwater resources are used to irrigaterice. Now is the time to develop technologies to allow farmersto grow as much rice they do now using much less water.l Rice research. Funding for public-sector rice research atthe national, regional and international level is stagnating, andthe interest that the private sector has shown in recent yearsappears to be waning. In the heyday of the Green Revolutionfrom the 1960s to the early 1980s, the rice-producing nationsof Asia managed to maintain annual yield increases of 2.5percent and production increases of over 3 percent. However,starting in the middle of the 1980s, yield growth has slowed byalmost half, and production growth has almost disappeared. Asa result, the rice-growing rural communities of many Asiannations are increasingly restless, trapped in poverty andurgently in need of new strategies and fresh ideas to help themimprove their lives. l

Ronald P Cantrell is the director general of the InternationalRice Research Institute (IRRI) in Los Banos, the Philippines.

riceWild about

R

COMMENTRonald P Cantrell

136 - 12 FEBRUARY 2004 #182

Last year, 67.7 million hectares of genetically modified cropswere grown all over the world. Although most of the crop was ofthe four main commercial kinds—soyabean, maize, cotton andcanola—it seems transgenic rice is going to be a major produceof the very near future. And it won’t be long before the transgenicrice seeds arrive in Nepal.

There are already over 160 patents granted or pending forvarious strains of GM rice. They contain genetic informationfrom the DNA of other species to give the rice traits rangingfrom bigger grain to insect resistance. The latest big thingcentres on ‘golden rice’—containing a daffodil gene thatproduces beta-carotene, a compound the human body convertsto vitamin A.

It’s not commercially available yet, but many see golden riceas the answer to the over one million child deaths each yearand the 300,000 cases of blindness caused by severe vitaminA deficiency. Biotech giant Monsanto has even announced it willgive away free licenses to use its patented technology for goldenrice and other genetically engineered rice varieties in order tohelp with these problems.

However, all that glitters is not gold. In addition to the usualarguments against GM crops, critics of golden rice protest thateven with the added nutrients, it would be nearly impossible toget the required vitamin A from a normal serving of rice. Someare sceptical of the longterm effects of the crop—a valid concernconsidering some of the other GM ‘miracles’ gone wrong in thepast. Others doubt that it can really be adapted to local growingconditions any time soon. A few even see golden rice as aTrojan Horse that is to be sent into the developing world to getpeople used to the idea of GM foods before less benign cropsare introduced.

Since over half of the world’s population’s staple diet is rice,the argument that golden rice and other fortified strains may bethe solution to current malnutrition problems is compelling. l

(Jemima Sherpa)

There is another reason to protect Nepal�s wetlands:they are repositories of wild rice varieties

ost Nepalis do not need to set aside ayear to �celebrate� the importance ofrice�it�s already their staple diet.

Indeed, rice is the main food for more thanhalf of humanity. Archaeological evidence fromcentral Thailand shows that human beingshave cultivated rice for the past 6,000 years.

In Nepal, rice fields make up 325,000hectares, accounting for most of thecountry�s total cultivated land area. Nepal�sJumli marshi dhan is a cold tolerant varietythat is the world�s highest-growing rice�cultivated at altitudes of nearly 3,000 metres.

We will hear a lot about rice in 2004.But for us in Nepal it is important to look atthe places from where this resource was takenand locally developed by farmers overcenturies. The last of our wild wetlands stillhosts this diversity. Wild rice species occurin the Himalayan foothills, Asian river deltas,Caribbean islands, Amazon River basin andinland swamplands of southern and westernAfrica. Although rice is found mostly in tropicalareas, the existence of one species (Oryzarufipogon) in Pokhara and surrounding theBulbule Lake area of Surkhet is the highest

latitude of wild rice growth reported in theworld.

In Nepal, various species of wild rice arefound in the plains, the Pokhara valley,Kamalpokhari in Palpa, Bulbule lake area in

Surkhet, Kapilvastu, Nepalganj, the Lotharforest of Chitwan, the Kankai IrrigationHeadwork area of Jhapa, the SundarpurAgricultural Farm area of Kanchanpur and

Nijgadh in Bara. Many of these wetland sites,important habitats of wild rice, are beingdegraded because of encroachment forconversion into rice fields, fishponds, extendedsettlements and sedimentation.

Although local communities use wild riceduring religious and cultural occasions, theyare not fully aware of the value of these wetlandgenetic resources and often consider it a weed.Government policy has also not given enoughimportance to the conservation of wild rice,and these habitats may soon be lost forever.

Nepal has four species of wild rice ofwhich one is an upland species and theothers are mostly found in tarai wetlands.

A weedy wild rice sometimes occurs in taraiwetlands mixed with cultivated rice. The wildrelatives of rice grown are important becausethey contain the original genetic material ofcultivated rice. Although it is fit for humanconsumption, it is not cultivated becauseharvesting is tedious. Wild rice is usuallyharvested for cattle feed.

Every year from October-December, thepeople around Ajingara Lake in Kapilbastu tiecloth and plastic bags on wild rice plants to

M collect their seeds called tinna/tinni rice thatare eaten during the Chhat festival and fastslike ekadashi. In the Lumbini area, wild rice(O rufipogon) has been culturally associatedwith the tarai ethnic communities.

In Nepal, farmers have developed andgrown more than 95 local aromatic and finerice varieties. Kaski district alone used to havemore than 75 local varieties. Today only 11varieties are widely grown. The remaining arebeing replaced or discontinued because ofmodern, higher yielding �improved� seeds.Farmers in Kosi Tappu Wildlife Reserve usedto cultivate multiple varieties of rice to reducecrop depredation and damage from wildanimals. These varieties have now beenreplaced with modern ones.

Despite the potential of wild rice, little hasbeen done to study its significant traits andbreeding habits. The government seems moreinterested in importing new modern hybridseeds than conserving native wild rice species.

To protect Nepal�s wild rice and its geneticresource for posterity, we need to protect ourwetlands where they grow. l

(Sameer Karki)

Wild rice from Ajingara Tal in Kapilbastu

ifty years ago, a Japanese agriculturalconsultant arrived in Nepal to advise farmerson the latest agricultural techniques. He

returned home earlier than anticipated, saying therewas nothing he could teach Nepali rice farmers.

The production of rice was good, the taste evenbetter, and entire families sustained themselvesusing traditional methods to plant an astoundingvariety of rice: Gudgude Marsi, Thauli, Mansara,Anadi, Rajbhog, Krishnabhog, Samundra Pheenz,Phalame.

At Nepal Agricultural Research Council(NARC) Bhola Man Singh Basnet, says this yearNepal has recorded the highest yield ever: 2.9 tonsper hectare. But 79 percent of the rice fields growhigh-yield hybrid rice, which means local varietiesare being driven out. The International RiceResearch Institute (IRRI) in the Philippinespreserves 1,800 local Nepali rice germplasm in arefrigerated earthquake-proof vault. The gene bankincludes the rich Tilki from Dang and the aromaticJetho Budo from Pokhara.

�Local varieties are important because they aredisease, drought and insect-resistant,� explainsBasnet. IRRI�s Green Revolution rice provideshigher yield, but lack the adaptability of local seeds.

In Kathmandu, some of the more popularimproved varieties found in the market includeKhumal-4, a fine non-glutinous rice andManjushree-2, another popular fine rice.Thaichung-176 is a glutinous rice very popular inKathmandu, particularly among the Newars tomake chiura and jand. Nepalis prefer the less stickynon-glutinous rice because it is easier to eat with thefingers.

Those eager to sample Nepali rice needn�tworry. It�s Binita Khanal�s business to know wherelocal varieties are grown and make them available toKathmandulays through her direct selling BazarEnterprises Network which provides pulses, tea, oil,spices, rice and more bought directly from theproducers.

There are four main Nepali rice found inKathmandu: Mansuli, Pokhrali, Jeera Maseeno andseveral varieties of Basmati. The most popular isMansuli which is cheaper with higher yields.

Pokhreli and Jeera Maseeno are more popular amongthe middle- and higher-middle class, while Basmativaries according to quality. Khanal�s personalfavourite is Jeera Maseeno: �It�s good for my entirehousehold, my employees and my children alike. Weall eat the same quality of rice and Jeera Maseeno isaverage.�

Her own experience has been that rice grown inthe belt spanning Sundarijal to Panauti tastes best.To those who want to sample different varieties ofrice, the old quarter of Asan and Mangal Bazar havea lot to offer. The ancient shops sell an astoundingvariety of rice piled into old oil tins, and the vendorswill guide you through the properties of each rice. l

MIN BAJRACHARYA

FOur rice

Franken-riceAll that glitters may not be gold

14 6 - 12 FEBRUARY 2004 #182PR0FILE

rom the son of a Darjeeling teaestate clerk, he eventuallybecame an artist-scholar

recognised at home and abroad forhis immense contribution to theNepali art. The life and work of LainSingh Bangdel is the subject ofAgainst the Current: The Life of LainSingh Bangdel Writer, Painter andArt Historian of Nepal written byestablished Nepal-hand DonMesserschmidt with Bangdel�sdaughter, Dina, currently an arthistorian at Ohio State University.

Messerschmidt, an anthropologistwho has spent nearly 30 years inNepal, was intrigued by Bangdel andapproached him about writing abiography. �Lain wrote like a painter,he used the pen like a brush. NowI�m painting him in words,� saysMesserschmidt.

Growing up in a Nepali migrantfamily in Darjeelingtown, as theycalled it, Bangdel remembers a feelingof disconnect, of rootlesssness, thatwas later reflected in his novels and

A new biographycelebrates the

life and works ofone of Nepal�sartistic giants

Lain�s legacy

SRADDHA BASNYAT

paintings. As a young boy,Bangdel waited for Teej when hecould paint colourful motifs onthe walls of the festival�smaitighar. His upbringing in aHindu family, and schooling byProtestant and Hindu educatorstaught Bangdel to respect allreligions. But father, Ranglal,didn�t allow him to play with thechildren of common labourers,having worked hard to raise hisfamily�s status. It was during hisenforced solitude that Bangdelbegan to sketch�his inspirationfound in nature�s unparalleledpalette.

In high school during the1930s, Bangdel was influenced bythree Nepali intellectuals: poetDharnidhar Koirala, ParasmaniPradhan, a Nepali language teacherand Suryabikram Gewali,collectively known as �SuDhaPa�.Gewali introduced Bangdel to the19th century poet BhanubhaktaAcharya and Bangdel discovered

his other passion�words. He passedthe entrance exams to the Universityof Calcutta. Dad Ranglal who wouldhave preferred his son to be a doctoror teacher, gave Bangdel somemoney but told him he�d be on hisown.

In July 1939, Bangdel headedto Calcutta, his first serious movetoward studying art at the CalcuttaArts College. Calcutta was a placewhere young intellectuals, artists andpoliticians came together in war-timepre-independence India. In aneffort to create an identity forhimself, Bangdel changed hissurname from Rai to Bangdel, thename of his clan.

But for all this social andpolitical activity around him,Bangdel got through school relyingon his art and writings to express hisdeep humanitarian concerns,remaining apolitical. In 1945, hegraduated at the top of his class, andcontinued to live and work inCalcutta for several more years.Bangdel produced three novelsbetween 1948 and 1951. During

his time in Calcutta Bangdel metmany influential people and madelasting friendships. Among them:dramatist Balkrishna Sama whorebelled against his Rana ancestryand Satyajit Ray, whose artisticcinematography made strong socialstatements, became Bangdel�s closefriends.

At the age of 31, Bangdel had achance to go to Paris after GeneralKaiser Shamsher JB Rana, impressedby Bangdel�s portrait of BalkrishnaSama, gave him Rs 5,000. On routehe spent four months in London.There he became reacquainted withManu Kumari Thapa whom heknew from Darjeeling and Calcutta.He toured museums and galleries,losing himself in the works ofLeonardo de Vinci and Rembrandt.

Paris was overwhelming.Everything was new�the language,art, techniques, styles. Bangdellearned French and began to paintagain in a tiny studio apartment.Winters were bitterly cold but hesurvived, sometimes on a singleapple a day. These trials gave birth

to some of his best works like theMuna-Madan series, Mother Nepal(1953), Pensive Mood (1955) andFamine in Bengal (1856-59). Hewas influenced by existential writerslike Albert Camus and Jean-PaulSartre. Bangdel met Georges Braqueand Pablo Picasso and began leaningtowards an abstract style influencedby nature.

Bangdel and Manu Kumaricorresponded and in 1953 heproposed to her. She wrote backconfused, concerned what herparents would say. She was the eldestchild of Chatra Singh Thapa, adescendent of General Amar SinghThapa. They were married in Parisduring spring.

In 1957, BP Koirala came toEurope and met Bangdel. He cameagain in 1960, when the couplewere living in London. Koirala triedto persuade Bangdel to return toNepal but the Bangdels had plansto migrate to Canada. Then in1961, while on a state visit toLondon, King Mahendra askedBangdel when he would return toNepal. Bangdel felt committed.

Unsure of their decision, thetwo came to Nepal where their onlychild Dina was born in 1963. Forthe next three decades Bangdeldedicated much of his time to theRoyal Nepal Academy, making theNepal Association of Fine Artsefficient and co-founded the NepalArt Council. He also turned himselfinto an art historian and wasfascinated with Kathmandu�sunique heritage which had been littlestudied and was falling prey toantique smugglers. So Bangdel setout to document Nepal�s ancientheritage, particularly stonesculptures, producing books likeEarly Sculptures of Nepal (1982),2500 years of Nepali Art (1987) andInventory of Stone Sculptures of theKathmandu Valley (1995). Hismost popular and most importantbook, however, was Stolen Imagesof Nepal (1989), documenting 300missing religious objects fromKathmandu.

Bangdel died during Dasai of2002. He wrote and painted to thevery end. Against the Current byDon Messerschmidt is due to bereleased this month. Order forms areat Mandala Book Point for thespecial limited edition available onlyin Nepal at Rs 850. l

Lain Singh Bangdel’s ‘Struggle forDemocreacy’, 1990, painted inNepal (left). Bangdel with BPKoirala and his wife, Manu Kumariin London in 1960 (below, left) andwith Indian director Satyajit Ray inKathmandu in 1987.

F

156 - 12 FEBRUARY 2004 #182ASIA

hina, a nascent space power, has beenshying away from accepting USPresident George W Bush’s invitation

for space-faring nations to join his country’smission to Mars—and is now making clear thatthe United States will not be alone in itsinterplanetary quests. In December, Chinaannounced it would embark on one of the mostambitious space programs this year bylaunching 10 satellites, beginning

ith the announcement byIndia�s ruling coalitionthat it will ask for the

dissolution of the Lower House ofParliament on 6 February, thecountry is all set for nationalelections to get underway probablyfive months before the term of theHouse ends. By all indications, itwill be a contentious, sharp andbitter fight. Contrary to appearances,the Hindu-nationalist, right-wingBharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is notabout to sweep the polls or win aclear parliamentary majority on itsown.

The ruling multiparty NationalDemocratic Alliance (NDA), whichthe BJP dominates, might be hardput to repeat its performance in thelast elections in 1999. PrimeMinister Atal Bihari Vajpayeehimself has warned his party that theelectoral battle will be fierce. Thereare several reasons for this, and atleast four are important.

First, the NDA is a shrinkingentity, unlike five years ago. In thepast 15 months, six of its original 22constituents have quit the alliance,including regional parties fromsouthern Tamil Nadu state andsmaller organisations representinggroups like Dalits (untouchables)from eastern Bihar state and farmersin the western part of Uttar Pradesh,India�s most populous state.

The biggest blow to the BJP wasthe breakdown of its alliance inUttar Pradesh with the strong DalitBahujan Samaj Party and that party�sdecision to oppose the BJP toothand nail in the coming elections.Second, the anti-NDA opposition ismaking serious efforts to formalliances so as not to divide its vote.(Traditionally, ruling parties in India

India�s rulingparty faces afierce time atthe upcomingpolls

tend to gain disproportionately fromhigh levels of opposition disunity,rather from their own popularity.)

Crucial to these efforts is theIndian National Congress� decisionnot to go in alone and to explore thebroadest possible coalition withother parties. The Congress party,which has ruled India for more than45 years of the 56 years ofindependence, until recently used toconsider itself the natural party ofgovernance and was loathe to formcoalitions. Recent defeats in threeimportant state assembly electionshave jolted the Congress out of itsarrogance and complacency.

It is now negotiating allianceswith other parties from Kashmir inthe north to Tamil Nadu in the deepsouth and from Maharashtra in thewest to the seven small north-easternstates. A third reason why thecoming elections will be closelyfought is that in India, the party orparties in power tend to suffer thedisadvantage of incumbency. In thepast 30 years, a ruling coalition hasbeen returned to power at thenational level only once in twoconsecutive elections. The Indianvoter prefers to punish parties ratherthan reward them.

The BJP/NDA rode on the anti-incumbency wave in 1998, when theruling centre-Left coalitioncollapsed. Today, the NDA faces theincumbent�s disadvantage. Finally,the BJP has sharply polarised Indiansociety and politics as never before.There are two main lines of division:one along the issue of religion andpolitics, which the BJP mixesdangerously; and the other, oneconomic policies with sharp classbiases.

The BJP is an ideologicallydriven party that stands for Hindusupremacism and a Hindu state,which will privilege this 80 percentmajority. The party is closely tied toextremist and violent organisations

gaping regional disparities. All thesefactors make for a robust fight in thenext elections. To win an absolutemajority on its own, the BJP wouldhave to win 50 percent more seatsthan it currently holds. There is noway it can do this�short of a wavein its favour and its allies� agreementto concede constituencies to it.

The BJP has a limited base,mainly in central and western India.As for the NDA, it reached asaturation point in a number ofstates where it holds a good amountor majority of seats. It will not beeasy to better this performance. Theopposition, by contrast, has a muchhigher chance of improving on its

1999 scores. However, theopposition cannot win the electoralrace unless it can project analternative set of policies and visionsthat are of relevance to, and catchthe imagination of, a majority of thepopulation. It has yet to work out acommon minimum program ormanifesto. Nor has the oppositionbeen able to form a single commonfront. l (IPS)

development of its lunar probe and preparingfor the country’s second manned space flight.

After an extended break over Chinese NewYear, the training programme of 14 astronautswill resume in March, according to the BeijingYouth Daily. It quoted Huang Weifan, director ofresearch at China Astronauts Selection andTraining Institute, as saying that the ‘Shenzhou6’—China’s spacecraft scheduled for launch nextyear—would carry two people on board. Chinese

officials have hailed the country’s first mannedspace flight on 15 October last year as a “giantleap” and declared that China’s space programwas going according to timetable.

“Although the Chinese government has yetto list its moon-probe program as a government-funded project, space experts have madepreparations for the project as it is almost certainto be approved,’’ said a Xinhua news agencyrecently. The government’s nod to theprogramme could come as early as March, whenthe National People’s Congress, or China’sParliament, convenes its annual session.

In December, state media already quotedSun Laiyan, deputy director of China NationalSpace Administration, as saying that a lunar-probe satellite was scheduled for launch by2007. An unmanned lunar landing by 2010 willfollow it some five years before the deadlineenvisaged by Bush for the United States to returnto the moon.

Under an ambitious scheme also announcedin December, Bush wants the USspace agency, the National Aeronautic and

Scientific Administration (NASA), to set up amoon base by 2020 and use the mission as aspringboard for future manned trips to Marsand beyond. Unveiling his blueprint for spacequest in January, Bush invited other countriesto participate in the program. “The vision Ioutline today is a journey, not a race, and I callon other nations to join us on this journey in aspirit of cooperation and friendship,” Bush said.

As the third country to send a person inspace after Russia and the United States, Chinaclearly ranks high on the list of countries thatare aiming for space exploration. But if historyis any judge, China may well decide it wants towalk down its own road. Before sending‘taikonaut’ Yang Liwei in space last year, 30years after other nations have sent man in orbit,China rejected cheaper and quickeralternatives to putting a Chinese in orbit.Beijing turned down US President RonaldReagan’s 1984 invitation to launch the firstChinese into space on the US space shuttleand later declined a similar offer from RussianPresident Boris Yeltsin. l (IPS)

Space raceChina is determined to launch it�s own interplanetary quest

ANTOANETA BEZLOVA in BEIJING

C

ANALYSISPraful Bidwai

Vajpayee�s gambleW

notorious for attacks on andpersecution of religious minorities,besides vandalism and rabidintolerance. Eleven years ago, theBJP and its associates razed to theground a 16th century mosque inUttar Pradesh, which they regardedas a symbol of the Muslim conquestof Hindu India in the Middle Ages.(Historians have a very different,multicultural, multi-religious, viewof India�s past).

Less than two years ago, theHindu-nationalists butchered over2,000 Muslims in the state ofGujarat in retaliation for the burningalive of 60 Hindu-nationalist cadresin a railway train�for which thevictimised Muslims were in no wayresponsible. India�s religiousminorities, some 180 millionpeople�or bigger than Brazil�spopulation�have never felt moreinsecure than under the BJP�s rule.The opposition sees the BJP as amajor menace to India�s secularConstitution and pluralistdemocracy. The BJP has alsopromoted brazenly elitistneoliberal economic policies,which have destroyed publicservices and undermined foodsecurity while further enrichingthe already rich.

In the last three years ofNDA rule, India�s GDP growthslowed down. But much worsewas the rise in unemployment,especially in the rural areas where70 percent of India�s populationlives. The economy only absorbsabout a third of the new entrantsinto the job market. But the incomesof the top tenth of the populationhave substantially increased�creating what the governmentcrudely terms the �feel good� or�India Shining� factor publicised inexpensive television and printadvertisements.

India has never experienced suchsharp income polarities or such

16 6 - 12 FEBRUARY 2004 #182INTERNATIONAL

n a rehearsal studio, a youngCuban ballet dancer turns throughthe air, pivoting as though some

invisible power has unfurled him in anarc. Then, without pause, he leapsonce, twice and I gasp at the height ofhis grandes jetés and then gasp againbecause his pointed toe is headingright for a barre.

Welcome to Cuba, a country thatdazzles and disappoints, where onefinds miracles and monsters, but noeasy answers. Cubans recognise thecontradictions as readily as anyoutsider. Yet even as inflation risesand the 77-year-old dictator tightensInternet access and closes theeconomic openings that encouragedself-employment in the mid-1990s, itis unlikely that Cubans will turnCastro out before he dies.

The rabidly anti-Castro Cubanexiles clustered in Miami argue that itis fear that holds Cubans back, butthat�s not true. A visitor in Cuba findsmany ready to complain, but thepalpable fear and visceral hatredrampant in El Salvador and Chile inthe 1980s is absent in today�s Cuba.Instead there is a kind of paralysis �born of a mix of loyalty, fear andindoctrination�as they grudginglywait for Castro to expire.

Unlike many of Latin America�sfreely elected governments, Castro hasactually provided his constituentswith public services�and withoutearning a reputation for corruption.

�All the free education and healthcare gives a certain balance,� said aprominent writer. �Their work is lessvaluable,� he said referring to thepesos Cubans earn in an economysustained by dollar remittances fromthe foreign diaspora. But �it�s not atotal disaster because people have thisbalance.�

So, unlike the East Europeanswho overthrew their corrupt politicalleaders in 1989, and some LatinAmericans who did so more recentlyin Bolivia, Argentina and Ecuador,Cubans have failed to rally againstCastro. Yes, Castro jailed 75independent journalists and others inan April sweep�that is the monsterin him. But other dissidents remainfree. That is the contradiction.

Moreover, unlike other luxury-loving Latin American leaders, Cubanofficials do not flaunt lavish lifestyles.Among Latin American countries,only Chile and Uruguay rate betterthan Cuba in TransparencyInternational�s corruption index. Butthis could change as dollars becomehard to resist and Cubans use them tocut through ridiculous bureaucratichurdles. Already, the dollar hascreated a divide in living standardsbetween those who have greenbacksand those who don�t.

Despite a moribund economy,Castro still delivers what the majorityof Latin American residents fail toget�free health care and educationand a relatively drug and crime-freeenvironment. With more than 40percent of Latin America�s populationliving in poverty, Cuba stands out asan example of a country where being

poor does not mean a life ofsqualor. Even World Bankpresident James Wolfensohnacknowledged in 2001 that Cubahad done a �great job� oneducation and health care.

More recently, in discussing theBank�s 2004 report MakingServices Work for Poor People,officials put Cuba among countrieslike Sri Lanka, Costa Rica andChina that �managed to achieve alevel of outcomes in health andeducation that are extremelyfavourable.� This winter, theCuban government reinvested someof its income from tourism inupgrading schools that deterioratedin the years following the loss ofSoviet aid. �Cubans are stillendeared by that,� said oneWestern diplomat.

Amazingly, many Latin Americaleaders fail to make the connectionbetween reducing poverty and theirown popularity. Compare Castro�scampaign to improve schools to apoverty reduction program wagedby Mexico�s InstitutionalRevolutionary Party during a six-year period in the 1990�s.

Mexico spent 1.2 percent ofGDP per year to provide basicservices to communities in Mexico.According to Santa Deverajan, thedirector of the World Bank�sWorld Development Report 2004,some studies showed that theprogram could have reducedpoverty by as much as 64 percent.Instead, the money was doled outto municipalities based on politicalloyalty, so poverty fell by only 3

percent. �If they had just given it outequally to the entire Mexicanpopulation,� Deverajan says, �itwould have reduced poverty by 13percent.�

Examples like this abound inLatin America, but it is a mistake forCastro to think that Latin America isthe competition. Cubans don�t thinkit is. Their touchstones are Madrid,Paris and New York. An educatedprofessional with a wife and twochildren takes a breath when herecalls a trip to Spain. �It�s hard toexplain how I felt when I went there.It wasn�t like another world oranother planet; it was like anothergalaxy.� With family in Spain, hecould immigrate, but he doesn�tconsider that option seriously. �Thisis where I want to live, but 5 percentof the way things are run has got tochange. They blame everything on

the embargo. We have a self-imposed embargo. We limitourselves.�

More precisely, Castro limitsCubans. They want to breathe, butlife with a patriarchal tyrant can besuffocating. Younger Cubans oftensound like well-educated teenagerswith parents who are too strict.They want to travel, publish whatthey want, dance when and wherethey want and experience the worldas Castro experienced it.

�It�s not my fight,� says one 28-year-old Cuban, referring to thepolitical battle of communism versuscapitalism that keeps him trapped onthe island. �I�m a new generation. Iwant to see as they had the chanceto see.� l (© Project Syndicate)

Lydia Chavez, a Professor at theUniversity of California at Berkeley, is

now editing a book about Cuba.

he European Union has come under fire from NGOs over a newinitiative to fund water resources. The European Commission,the executive arm of the European Union (EU), adopted a proposal

to allocate $1.2 billion to improve access to water and sanitation forthe Africa, Caribbean and the Pacific (ACP) bloc. The group comprises79 countries. Forty of these are considered to be among the leastdeveloped countries (LDC). They are economically vulnerable andheavily dependent on EU aid.

The Commission’s proposal follows, in part, a commitment madeat the World Summit on Sustainable Development in Johannesburgin 2002 to deliver on the millennium development goal of halving thenumber of people without access to safe drinking water and basicsanitation by 2015. About 1.1 billion people lack access to safe drinkingwater, and 2.4 billion people to sanitation. Despite progress towardsthese goals, the Commission says funds remain scarce. Officials say afurther $52.2 billion is needed to meet water and sanitation targets.

The Commission had launched the ACP Water Fund last May, butthe proposal was rejected by the European Council, which bringstogether the heads of state or government of the 15 member states ofthe EU and the president of the European Commission. The councilwas divided over the source of the funds. The source remainscontroversial. Money for the new initiative will be taken from reservefunds of the EDF. ACP countries receive EU development aid throughthis fund. In 2000 member states allocated $15.8 billion to the fundover five years, but kept $1.2 billion in reserve pending a mid-termreview of the EDF. The review is expected later this year.

The Commission says the new resources being provided throughuse of this reserve fund can promote new initiatives, provide technicalassistance, build research and management capacity and “providethe flexible source of funding which is often the missing link infinancing of sustainable water and sanitation-related programs.” Butcivil society groups here say the Commission’s initiative will harm ACPcountries. l (IPS)

Castro�s CubaIt�s a country that dazzles and disappoints, where onefinds miracles and monsters, but no easy answers

COMMENTLydia Chavez

Money flow forwater challenged

I

I

T

f the �war on terror� is beginning to look increasinglylike the Cold War, then President George W Bush�sfiscal year 2005 foreign-aid request will not change that

impression. While Bush proposes to increase funding forthe Millennium Challenge Account (MCA) and anti-AIDSmoney for African and Caribbean countries, he is alsocutting funds for other key humanitarian and developmentaccounts. At the same time, the president is asking Congressto increase military and security assistance by more than$1 billion. Those two categories, which include anti-drugaid and proliferation categories, would make up nearlyone-third of all US foreign aid under Bush�s request, roughlythe same percentage of total foreign aid when the ColdWar reached its height during the 1980s.

Under Bush�s proposals, credits for foreign militariesto buy US weapons and equipment would increase bysome $700 million to nearly $5 billion, the highest total in

US foreign aid budgettakes a familiar route

Cold War castwell over a decade. Under his plan, military spending,which already constitutes roughly one-half of the world�stotal military expenditures, would rise by some sevenpercent, to $402 billion in FY 2005, which begins 1October.

That figure does not include an anticipated $50 billionmore that the administration is expected to request tofund military and related operations in Iraq and Afghanistanlater in the year. The projected deficit for FY 2005 nowstands at some $521 billion, an amount so great that eventhe normally deferential International Monetary Fund(IMF) warned recently the United States is approaching afiscal crisis that threatens global financial stability.

Countries considered critical in the war on terror willsee significant increases in credits and aid, some of it fromthe Economic Support Fund (ESF), a category of securityassistance used during the Cold War to give support tokey geo-political allies. ESF will increase by more than 20percent to more than $2.5 billion if Bush�s proposal isapproved. Pakistan will get nearly $700 million under theplan, while aid to Afghanistan is slated at $1.2 billion.

The increases in military and ESF funding will comelargely at the expense of humanitarian and developmentassistance, whose core programs will be reduced by about$400 million in 2005. The new request also proposes only$200 million in FY 2005 for the Global Fund to FightAIDS, Tuberculosis and Malaria. Congress last yearapproved $550 million to the fund despite theadministration�s objections. l (IPS)

JIM LOBE in WASHINGTON

176 - 12 FEBRUARY 2004 #182SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY

cientists long anticipated thatan influenza virus will spread�as now appears to be

happening in Asia�from wild birds tohumans, causing a pandemic. But fewpredicted last year�s SARS epidemic, apneumonia caused by a coronavirus.Prior to 2003, coronaviruses rankedvery low on the scale of importanthuman diseases, mostly beingassociated with the common cold.But we have long known thatcoronaviruses can cause dreadfuldiseases in domestic animals. Wesimply haven�t learned our lesson.

Indeed, events of the last coupleof decades�the AIDS virusestransferring from monkeys to man,followed by their global spread, beingjust one example�should haveconvinced us that, where diseases are

concerned, the unexpected willhappen. After all, the �jumping� ofviruses from wild animals to humansis more common than we like tothink.

All types of virus strains orvariants exist, somewhat akin to dogsexisting as different breeds.Veterinarians and farmers have longknown of a coronavirus that can kill90 percent or more of young pigs.Less well known is the fact that catsand dogs are infected by a coronavirusthat can also cause disease in pigs.

The cat coronavirus can causelethal abdominal disease in cats, whilesome strains of the chickencoronavirus cause kidney diseaserather than just bronchitis. There issimply no room for complacencywhere viruses or bacteria, for thatmatter, are concerned.

Evolution, whether of microbesor humans, involves pushing at themargins, going a little bit further thanyesterday or last year, driven by theneed to find additional sources offood. Humans, unlike other creatures,may also desire more of everything.Whatever the reason, we invade othercreatures� space by, say, cutting downforests.

As we come close to otheranimals, their viruses come closer tous. The outcome can be the same if

ANALYSISDavid Cavanagh

Jump potentialesearch in nanotechnology is thriving in developing countries buthigh-profile criticism of the new process from the likes of PrinceCharles and Greenpeace will hurt investment and threatens to create

a “nano divide” between rich and poor countries, says a new report.Despite its fantastic sounding name, the technology is actually verypractical for developing countries, where existing methods of treatingsanitation, for example, do not actually work well or are very expensive,says Abdallah Daar, from the University of Toronto’s Joint Centre forBioethics. “Nanotechnology could be better and cheaper, as well as being

a profitable industry for countries in the South,” said Daar, one of theco-authors of the report published in the UK journal Nanotechnology.

Nanotechnology refers to the manipulation of matter at the level ofatoms and molecules. Where biotechnology involves manipulating genes,the basic units of the genetic code, nanotechnology could potentially useatoms to build a gene. Over the past four years, the United States hasinvested several billion dollars to develop the technology. The market fornano products and services is predicted to reach $1 trillion by 2015,according to the US National Science Foundation.

Countries like China, India and South Korea have well-establishednano research centres and commercial products on the market. Thailand,Philippines, South Africa, Brazil and Chile are not far behind, with theirgovernments funding the new technology. China is testing a nanotechbone scaffold in 26 patients. India plans to use quantum dots in a fast,low-cost diagnostic tool for treating tuberculosis. India is alsocommercialising a US-patented “nano particle” drug delivery system, whileBrazil hopes its “nano magnets” can be used to clean up oil spills.

But if calls for a moratorium on nano products by Greenpeace andCanada’s ETC Group are heeded, it could mean the end for nano in theSouth. “Just because ‘nano materials’ are small doesn’t mean they’re safe,”says Pat Mooney, ETC’s executive director. In 2002 the group began acampaign to ban commercial production of new products fromnanotechnology until more research is done on the risks.

Regulatory agencies in the United States and Europe have begunlooking at the issue and to fund research. In the next few weeks, newstudies will be released saying some nanoparticles do pose a danger,says Mooney. Daar and his co-authors acknowledge that nanotech couldpose some risks. But they worry activists’ “fear-mongering” will result ina debate raging over the risks to the North, while any potential benefits topeople in the South will be ignored. Mooney’s group plans to make a formalproposal for an international convention on the evaluation of newtechnologies at the Convention on Biological Diversity in Kuala Lumpur,Malaysia in February. l (IPS)

we trap, enclose, and trade wildanimals, such as civet cats, whichseems to be the scenario that led toSARS in humans. When a virus hasbeen associated with its host for avery long time, it mutates to a formthat grows well without killing itshost, which would be a pointlessoutcome from an evolutionarystandpoint. A well-understoodexample is that of influenza viruses inwild fowl, where the virus causesinfections that are hard to detect.

But if an influenza virus jumpsfrom, say, ducks to chickens, theremay be lethal consequences. Thevirus is not well adjusted to thechicken, and some strains of the virus�go berserk.� It is possible that theSARS coronavirus does not causeserious disease in its natural, wildanimal hosts. Our problem arosewhen we enabled the virus to movefrom its normal home into us, by�farming� civet cats and otheranimals.

Many human viral diseases havenot been with us very long, perhapsonly 10-20,000 years. Most probably,the viruses came from the wildanimals in whose environment wewere encroaching. In other words,the SARS outbreak was not a novelevent. Chinese researchers havedetected antibodies to SARS-likeviruses in 2 percent of people fromwhom blood samples were taken in2001, a year before the disease firstoccurred. Many animal traders testedin 2003 in a market in the epicentreof the SARS outbreak also had theantibodies, again with no history ofdisease. This shows that the SARSvirus has jumped species, fromanimals to man, on other occasions,with benign consequences.

The difference in late 2002 was,perhaps, that people were infectedwith a variant that �went berserk�and grew too extensively in humans.It was bad luck. It is also possiblethat, again by chance, a benign SARSvirus from a civet cat mutated after itinfected people, becoming highlyvirulent. Both aspects of thisscenario�a virus jumping to astrange host and then mutating to adevastating form�are familiar.Waterfowl commonly spreadinfluenza viruses to chickens,although the outcome usually is not

serious. On occasion, however, thevirus mutates to a lethal form thatcan kill almost 100 percent of itsvictims. It is a highly virulentinfluenza virus such as this that isdevastating chickens in parts of Asia.

That influenza virus has also�jumped� from the chickens to thosewho look after them, killing somepeople. The influenza virusesestablished in humans for severaldecades originated from bird viruses.The chronic fear of health authoritiesis that, by chance, another avianinfluenza virus will mutate andspread from person to person tospawn a global pandemic.

Human SARS might never havespread to the extent that it did(killing 800 people and devastatingeconomies) if the problem had beenopenly acknowledged, with theWorld Health Organization involvedfrom the outset. Similar failings haveexacerbated the consequences oftoday�s bird-origin influenzaepidemic in Vietnam, Thailand andelsewhere. Some countries that havethe greatest reservoirs of viruses with�jump potential� are ill-equippedpolitically, socially and institutionallyfor the world to have confidence inthem.

Humans will continue to pushagainst our existing boundaries,whether out of necessity, curiosity,pleasure, or greed, so more virusjumps will undoubtedly occur. Wemust trust the WHO and itsassociates to come to our rescue, asit did so admirably with SARS. Butthose involved in human andveterinary medicine must no longerremain aloof from one another.Recent events have made crystalclear what we already knew�thathuman and animal viruses are notmutually exclusive. l(© Project Syndicate)

David Cavanagh is the head ofCoronavirus Group at the Institute for

Animal Health, UK.

Where diseases are concerned,the unexpected will happen

S

STEPHEN LEAHY in BROOKLIN, CANADA

Nano divideIt�s no small matter

R

18 6 - 12 FEBRUARY 2004 #182

SELECTED MATERIAL TRANSLATED EVERY WEEK FROM THE NEPALI PRESS

FROM THE NEPALI PRESS

QUOTE OF THE WEEK

�It�s appalling that student leaders are trying to dictate terms to political party heads.�

� Hiranyalal Shrestha, independent politician, in Janbhawana, 2 February

Protestors and Prime MinisterHouse on fire: National prideHand: Foreign investment in media

Rajdhani, 1 February

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Bad medicineRajdhani, 31 January

Sub-standard drugs are being soldthroughout the kingdom and itcould risk the health of Nepalis,warns the Department of DrugAdministration (DDA). During aninvestigation of pharmacies inNarayanghat, Butwal andKrishnanagar, drug inspectorsfound sub-standard medicines werebeing sold that could even causefatalities. The investigation startedafter the department receivedcomplaints of ineffective drugsbeing sold by Indian companiesthat were not authorised by theDDA to supply medicines inNepal. According to procedure,foreign pharmaceutical companieshave to register with the DDA forpermission to sell drugs in Nepal.Of the 6,000 brands, more thanhalf are imported. Fake andsubstandard drugs come inthrough the open border. Thelatest investigation uncovered 11unregistered companies involved inillegally supplying towns along theNepal-India border. These drugsmay have also penetrated the hillareas.

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Dying of hungerRajdhani, 1 February

KALIKOT � In Khalagaun andPadamghat, the state food depothas not supplied rice in four years.The men have all migrated to Indiaand those left behind�women, theaged and children�are weak withhunger. The women can�t travelbecause of the weather andrestricted movement imposed bythe Maoists. �We are graduallylosing all the food and water in ourvillages,� says Sulchina Shah. Till afew months ago, there was a smallgrocery shop in the village wherelocals could buy food at reasonableprices and on credit. Now they

Sher Bahadur Deuba in Deshantar, 1 February

The king’s recent remarks that appeared in his interview withTime fanned the flames that razed the country. He appears tobe in no mood to reconcile with the political parties of thedissolved House of Representatives or to provide a solutionto the current crisis. He shows no indication that he is readyto correct his unconstitutional move. The king seems to thinkhe does not have enough power in a multiparty democracyand the present constitution.

I don’t think he wants to be an absolute monarch. But thesituation doesn’t allow him to be an active monarch either. Iftheir words are to be believed, the Indian government andleaders of the political parties are for a constitutionalmonarchy and the multiparty system.

I have always been a well-wisher of the king: as primeminister, I tried to accommodate many of his interests. I wascriticised for doing that. The king desired the prestige thatcame with his monarchy. I gave utmost importance to that buthis real desire is now apparent—to become an active king. Ididn’t realise that till I was sacked.

The Maoists have not accepted the existence of otherpolitical parties. Even if the latter showed their willingness todeal with the rebels, the Maoists continue to physically attackpeople associated with the parties. They have not showntheir commitment to democracy, so there is no way we canjoin hands with them. We’d rather go with the king. But thatalliance is not going to be at the cost of the parties’principles and values. But if the Maoists show they arecommitted to democracy and give up violence, we could jointhem too.

The king doesn’t gain by blaming the parties. After all, weare Nepalis. In a democracy, it is common to see the positiveand negative aspects of political leaders. The people canpunish them. Some say there have been no leaders inNepal. So, should we import our leaders? We makemistakes, but they can be corrected.

Article 127 was meant to clear hurdles, not addcomplications. Constitutional experts and drafters of theconstitution have reasons to say that the king violated thatconstitutional provision when he made his move on 4October 2002. True, I failed to hold elections on time. Iaccept my mistake. All the parties had recommended thatthe elections be postponed so I had little choice in thematter.

I am not sorry for dissolving the House ofRepresentatives. That was my compulsion. I consulted GirijaPrasad Koirala on extending the state of emergency and hehad no problem with it at the time. I also brought the issueup in an all-party meeting, where again it was met with noopposition. But when the proposal was registered in theparliament, they demanded its withdrawal. How can nationalsecurity be treated like that? Should they not have thoughtthat the move would bring the morale of security agenciesdown? Moreover, the ruling partyshould have helped the government. Instead, it createdobstacles. The dissolution of the parliament was my owndecision. The king was not involved.

During my recent meeting with the king, I proposed threeideas to resolve the present crisis. I told him that GirijaPrasad Koirala was in favour of the restoration of parliamentand that five parties are for an all-party government under theleadership of Madhab Kumar Nepal. I said that although myparty’s primary demand is the reinstatement of mygovernment, I have no problems if the king agrees to thereinstatement of an all-party government. The king didn’treact. He just listened.

Solutions andresponses

have to walk for three hours toreach the nearest bazar where thecheapest rice costs about Rs 40 perkg. The food shortage is so acutethat the women hide in theirneighbour�s house to avoid feedingguests. There is danger of famine in14 VDCs if the food shortageworsens. Nanakali Malla�s husbanddrowned while fishing, and nowher family of seven faces starvation.�For many nights we have gone tobed hungry,� says Malla. A fewyears ago, the local women wereable to earn cash by selling landand cattle but the the rebelsprohibited these transactions.About 4,000 families from 30VDCs in the district have alreadymigrated to India. The remainderlives in misery and terror. The FoodDepot Corporation has been tryingto distribute subsidised rice, wheatand maize but the Maoists createdobstacles. The local women say ifsomething is not done quickly, theywill all die of hunger.

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No investigationSpacetime, 3 February

Just when the CIAA beganinvestigating possible corruption inthe Employment PromotionCommission (EPC), thegovernment began the process ofdissolving the body. Thecorruption watchdog started itsinvestigation after obtaining proofthat the EPC was involved in acorruption scam for a trainingprogram worth more than Rs 20million. An official with the CIAAsaid that the commission hadexamined the case and waspreparing to file a case against someofficials of the EPC.

No sooner did the news of theCIAA investigation come out, thegovernment started the process ofdissolving the EPC that has PrimeMinister Thapa as its chairman.The EPC had reached an

agreement with Unlimited NewMedia Company to train1,500 youth for medicaltranscription. The commission wassupposed to pay Rs 25,000 peryouth for nine months of training.Although the private companyshut shop in six months, EPCmade the full payment of morethan Rs 20 million.

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New strategyNepal Samacharpatra, 3 February

CHITWAN � The five agitatingpolitical parities have a new policyto focus the movement in 10districts that are directly connectedto Kathmandu. Their strategy is to�hit the highways�. A meeting ofdistrict committee chairmen inChitwan decided that themovement would mainly becentred along the Prithbi andTribhuban Rajpath. Chairmen ofChitwan, Gorkha, Tanahun,Dhading, Kaski, Nawalparasi andLamjung concluded with a 19-point common agenda. Theyhinted bandhs may be announcedin these districts. The districtleaders of five political parties havedecided to forward their advice tothe central body, suggesting a 10-day general strike to �thrashregression once and for all�.According to Devi Gyawali, districtsecretary of CPN-UML, motorcyclerallies, mass meetings and rallies willbe organised alongside bandhs.(Nepalnews.com TranslationService)

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HomelessKantipur, 1 February

NEW DELHI � Nepali children arefleeing their villages to escapeconflict. More than 100 childrenwho don�t have proper addressesand names of parents have endedup in orphanages in the Indian

MIN BAJRACHARYA

196 - 12 FEBRUARY 2004 #182FROM THE NEPALI PRESS

capital. �I came from Tarukdistrict,� says 14-year-old Rahulwho can�t remember the names ofhis parents. Manoj, another child,says he too came from Nepal buthe does not know the name of hisvillage or how he came to NewDelhi. �So many requests come tous to return these children back totheir villages, but without properintroductions and addresses, wehave difficulties releasing themfrom the orphanages,� said DurgaPrasad Aryal from the MigrantNepali Friends Group. In the pastyear, the organisation has helped60 women and children to returnbut lack of documents and properintroduction makes it difficult toget authorisation from the courtsto repatriate the children.

The organisation recentlyrescued about 45 Nepali childrenfrom Apollo Circus and sent themback home to Nepal. �It takesmonths to clear the legal processand produce documents for theirrelease,� says Aryal. At times, whenfinding evidence of theirwhereabouts is difficult, UNIFEMhelps to hand the children overthrough ABC Nepal, aKathmandu-based NGO.

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1,500 orphansRajdhani, 31 January

Babita Rawal, a four-year-old fromHumla, is waiting for her mother.She doesn�t know that the Maoistskilled her after she refused to paythem a donation. In Jajarkot, six-year-old Sinam Acharya�s motherwas shot to death by the army forviolating the curfew. She hadstepped out to fetch some water.

There are many Babitas andSinams in Nepal today. Theconflict is an orphan factory. TheUN has introduced a conventionon child rights to make the stateaccountable for the protection andsecurity of children, but in Nepalthere is no sign of the governmentdoing much for them. Both the

Deshantar, 1 February

The publishing business of daily newspapers that has flourishedunder multiparty democracy has suddenly become an unhealthycompetition. This is evident in the row between APCA whichpublishes The Himalayan Times (THT) and Kantipur Publications.The Nepal Media Society (NMS), made up of Nepali publishers,has given its full support to Kantipur publications. It has targetedTHT for publishing a misleading article about Buddha being bornin India, thus hurting the national sentiments of the Nepali people.But it seems the real issue is over the low price of THT and itssister publication Annapurna Post. It is undeniable that thesetwo are the largest selling dailies. In terms of circulation, THT isregarded as the top selling English language daily newspaperdue to it’s price and has little to do with news, quality or design.Nepalis own less than five percent of APCA’s share, which hasbeen dogged by controversy even before THT was launched.

The Himalayan Times, initially sold at Rs 2, dropped to Rs 1after The Kathmandu Post lowered its price from Rs 4 to Rs 1.50.The fight between these two publication houses has embroiledstudent unions and political parties. The issue has alreadybecome politicised, what with the public burning of THT andAnnapurna Post. The Nepal Media Society justifies their actions,saying political parties were responsible for acting against ‘anti-national’ broadsheets. APCA, however, believes that KantipurPublications is behind the entire exercise.

Meanwhile, Kantipur has complained that the government hasnot taken any legal action despite such a national protest againstthese two newspapers. Whatever the reason, this kind ofunhealthy competition could destroy a newspaper industry thathad just started flourishing in Nepal. It is natural to protest againsta publishing house whose finances are not transparent. Readerswant APCA to be clearer about its financial dealings and KantipurPublications to compete in the market in a healthy manner.

state and the Maoists use children:they are often forced to work asmessage bearers, informers and evenbear arms. The state has used youngchildren as informants.

Since the �People�s War� began,about 300 children have lost theirlives. More than a 1,000 aredisabled because they were caughtin crossfire or stepped on landminesplanted by both sides, according to areport from Child DevelopmentSociety. More than 1,500 childrenhave been orphaned, over 10,000left homes and migrated to townsand to India. About 70 percent ofthe schools in the Maoist affectedareas are closed. Despite constantcalls to declare children as zones ofpeace, the government has not givenany direction to prevent them frombeing party to this conflict. The leastit could do is declare schools as zonesof peace.

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EU pressureExcerpts from editorial inKantipur, 4 February

Pressure from the European Union(EU) to improve the human rightssituation in the country makes itclear that the internationalcommunity is closely monitoring therapidly deteriorating situation here.Observers have taken this in thelight of the diplomatic community�sstrong support for the NationalHuman Rights Commission(NHRC). The memorandum ofunderstanding prepared by NHRCduring the ceasefire between the

Unhealthyjournalism

government and the Maoists wasmeant to guide the conduct ofboth fighting sides. It includedhuman rights instruments that thegovernment has signed. TheMaoist rebels had also pledged thatthey would show their supportand assistance to the proposalpresented by the commission. Werepeatedly hear or sometimes evencome across an incident whereeven the minimum level of humanrights have been violated orbreached. Citizens are denied theright to live their life with self-respect and dignity. It is importantto protect such basic rights aseducation, health and the freedomto move unhindered. Freedom ofexpression should be there withoutany prejudice. If these are notrespected, then the country willslide further. The EU has stressedthe importance of an all-partygovernment, immediateparliamentary elections andimprovement in law and order.(Nepalnews.com TranslationService)

20 6 - 12 FEBRUARY 2004 #182HISTORY AND CULTURE

fter the armistice it was proclaimed that whoevercaught Hitler would be offered crores in reward. Ahandful of us were selected to capture Hitler. To our

consternation, we found out that all German survivors of thewar looked like Hitler. A number of themwere caught and questioned. They turnedout to be fake Hitlers. Later, we found outhe had already committed suicide.

Subash Chandra Bose had a differentidea from those of Gandhi and Nehru. Theypreferred a gradual, peaceful approach, Bosewas for driving them out. At that momentthe Japanese had captured three Gurkhabattalions and made them prisoners of war inSingapore. Bose joined hands with someGurkhas to fight alongside the Japanese. So,Gurkhas were fighting in both the British andthe Japanese armies against each other! TheJapanese continued fighting in Asia even afterthe German surrender.

We came back to India on leave as soon as the war inGreece was over. We danced and sang on the ship on the wayback since the war had come to a close. Since we had nomadal we resorted to beating tins throughout our sea journey.It took three full days and nights to reach Karachi. In thosedays Pakistan did not exist. It took another three days andnights for us to arrive at Dehradun by train.

We went home on three months� leave, but before thatwe had to go through a purification ceremony in which wehad to gulp cow urine three times a day for seven days andwere allowed only one meal a day. We gave a quarter or half arupee to the priest who gave us cow urine. The Rana regimeof the day required people to observe the ceremony. I wasn�tyet married. My wife is still here with me.

There were several generations in the army. I have seen agrandfather, father and grandson serving in the same unit. Thegrandfather was mess sergeant, father a sergeant and grandsonwas in training. It was now time for the British to leave Indiaand riots erupted between Hindus and Muslims. Hindusstarted killing Muslims and vice-versa. It was a war of a moredifficult nature. Hindus suspected that British were sidingwith the Muslims and made the British their target. Wepatrolled the streets with machine guns and grenades. Theriots in Bombay were quelled.

Then came the moment of dividing Gurkha troops intoBritish and Indian regiments. Under that arrangement sixregiments were to stay with India and the rest four would go

with the British. There were two generals�one for the Britishand theother for India. There were instances when one brotherremained with the British whereas the other was in an Indian

regiment. I fell in the lot of the British and wentto serve in Malaya and Singapore. No sooner didwe reach there, war broke out against thebandits. There were huge stocks of weaponsabandoned by the Japanese and the British.Even Chinese were adversaries in that guerrillawar.

Life was full of hardship in the jungle. Theplace was infested with malaria besides wildanimals, serpents and scorpions. The warlasted nine years and troops from NewZealand, Fiji, Australia and Britain took part.The Fijians were bigger in size than others, thesize of their boots were much bigger. Theyhad rendered much help to Gurkhas, so it was

ordered from above to send them a suitable present.What could be the present from Gurkhas other than thekhukuri? I had been assigned from the army to present themwith a khukuri made of silver. They showed us exceedingrespect.

While fighting a few of us made a pact that those wholived would go to the homes of dead comrades and consoletheir family. Harka Bahadur Thapa of Gorkha, Shankar DebThapa of Palpa and myself pledged to do that. In the longrun, I survived but those two laid down their lives in theGreek war. On my return to Nepal, I visited Harka Bahadur�sfamily home in Gorkha. He was very recently married and hadno children. His mother was very old and as soon she heardthe news she wept. Later, the village people came andconsoled her saying not one but so many people all over theworld lost their lives.

Moved, I came up with a proposal to establish a Gurkhawelfare office. Some servicemen gave a month�s salary .Subsequently a group of army personnel accompanied by topclass band toured Singapore, Malaya and Canada to raisefunds. The largest amount was collected in Canada. I servedfor seven years in the welfare office after my retirement fromthe army. My experience in the welfare program made me facesituations where there was no one to collect pensions. In oneinstance all three brothers were killed in the war. None hadmarried and after the demise of their parents no one was leftto collect the money. In another family in Bhirsi in Gorkha,all five brothers were killed: three brothers in the SecondWorld War and two in the jungles of Malaya in 1948.

Armistice and afterAs the Second World War ends, ex-British GurkhaBharati Gurung, 92, continues his recollection of theperiod after the war: the bounty on Hitler, India�sindependence, the division of the Gurkha army andlater, his involvement in a Gurkha welfare office inNepal. Bharati Gurung�s story is part of thetestimony of Gurkha soldiers, translated from theNepali Lahurey ka Katha by Dev Bahadur Thapa forNepali Times.

A

Bigben is the symbol of the cooperation between Biggyan, an8th grader from Chitwan and Bernard, a travel writer andexpedition leader. Bernard taught art in Europe, and drew streetscenes wherever he went. Last year Bernard taught Biggyanthe basics in watercolours and this year they started doingcartoons, some mildly satirical.

“I realised that Nepal has very few creativecartoonists,” says Bernard. “I was dismayed at seeing yournational papers sporting mostly poor American cartoons.”Bernard hopes the cartoons will instill self-confidence inBiggyan and be a vehicle for his creativity. Welcome to theworld of Demo the yellow rhino, the long-awaited Nepal tourismmascot, and his other friends.

To be serialised in this space in Nepali Times every week.

Cartoon joint venture

Bigben

It's raining rhinos!

BIGBEN

216 - 12 FEBRUARY 2004 #182SPORTS

on’t believe the propaganda, golf is actually simple and easy toplay. You place a small hard ball on the ground, and hit it with along club. In as few hits as possible, try and get it into a cup in a

small hole in the ground marked by a flag.A standard golf course has 18 holes, usually between 100-600 yards

long, each with a tee where the first hit is made, a fairway of grass, and asmooth grass green where the hole islocated. Such a simple game wouldsoon be unfashionable. Who wouldaspire to be good at something soeasy? Thus exotic terms have been

added to make the game appear more glamorous.Here is a guide so the uninitiated can enlighten themselves and

understand the mysterious terms used by the golfing fraternity to make thissimple game appear so complex.

Basic terms for a golf course’s features:

Tee – The starting point, the beginning of the hole, where you hit your firstof many shots to try and get the ball into the cup. This is a flat areaidentified by two markers spaced a few yards apart. There are different teeson each hole for men and women of different playing abilities. Nowadayseach hole has four sets of tees, the furthest from the hole being the blacktee markers for men’s championships and professionals, slightly closer tothe hole—blue markers for normal men players (that is, if any male golfercan be considered normal), white markers for seniors, men’s beginners,and better juniors and ladies, and the closest to the hole red markers forladies and beginner juniors.

Fairway – A well manicured, closely mown area between the tee and thegreen, usually between 30 to 60 yards wide, and down the center of thedirection you should be hitting the ball. Fairway grass is cut quite shortand kept in good condition to make play easier by rewarding a straightshot from the tee. The reward is a golf ball which sits nicely on top of theshort grass and is easier to hit with control.

Rough – Less well maintained areas of longer grass on either side of thefairway, placed with the intention of making shots that were not hit on thefairway more difficult to play, as the ball sinks down into the longer grass.

Bunker – A pit filled with sand. It is much more difficult to play a shotfrom a bunker, so these are fiendish obstacles placed in strategic areas tomake the game more challenging and difficult.

Hazard – Hazards include water bodies, ditches, drains and bunkers whichare again placed to make the game more challenging, forcing a golfer totake into account strategies of avoiding these hazards. If you cannot hityour ball out of a hazard, you play from outside the hazard and add a oneshot penalty to your score for that hole.

Out of Bounds – Outside the allowed area of play. For example, if you hityour ball into the neighbouring rice paddy field. In this case you have toadd two shots to your score for that hole and hit the ball again from thesame place.

Green – A flatter, smoother area, with very short evenly cut grass thatallows the ball to be rolled towards and hopefully into the cup placed inthe ground. This cup is 4.5 inches in diameter and is marked by thin poleplaced in its center topped with a flag.

When you’ve finally managed to repeatedly hit the ball from the tee andget it into the cup, then play is completed for that particular hole.

Round of Golf - You must play 18 holes to complete one round of golf.Each hole has all the features revealed above, and generally a full lengthGolf course has 18 holes. Smaller courses have 9 holes which are playedtwice to complete the requisite magical number of eighteen.(To be continued in this space next week.)

Deepak Acharya is a golf instructor and Head Golf Professional at GokarnaForest Golf Resort & Spa, Kathmandu.

prodeepak@hotmail.com

Free instruction for those who always wantedto take up golf, but ddin�t know where to start

Golf for beginners I

n early 1970s Catalonia, theresentment against GeneralFranco was profound and deep.

One of the few public places wherethe people could speak their ownlanguage was the Nou Camp, theBarcelona football stadium. Thatwas why the arrival of the Dutchfootballer Johan Cruyff to play forBarcelona in August 1973 wastreated almost as if it was a secondcoming.

�This gaunt, gangly little fellowwho smoked like a chimney gave usback our pride,� says an elderlyCatalan interviewed in RamonGieling�s new documentary, JohanCruyff: At a Given Moment.

A series of coincidences helpedcement the Dutchman�srelationship with the Catalanpublic. Cruyff�s wife was heavilypregnant. The birth was induced afew days early, so he could play inthe most important game of all,against Real Madrid at theBernabeu. Largely thanks to Cruyff,Barcelona won 5-0 in a game thateven now few Catalans can talkabout without getting goosebumps.

Then, simply because he and hiswife liked the name, they decidedto call their new son Jordi. This, itturned out, was the name of thepatron saint of Catalonia and wasforbidden under Franco�s laws.When Cruyff tried to register thebirth, the clerks told him he shouldcall his son Jorge. He refused. AsJordi had been born in Holland,the authorities were powerless tostop Cruyff using the name. �Buthe was not aware of the immensepolitical meaning of the name,�Gieling says.

At a Given Moment is not aconventional sports documentary.Although the film ends with a longinterview with the footballer,Gieling�s real focus is on theCatalan people who are invited toshare their favourite Cruyffmoment.

The film opens with Cruyff inshirt, trousers and loafers kickingaround a ball on a patch of grasshigh in the mountains. He tells thekid in goal he is going to blast theball, hits it and it spirals off intothe sky. We then see it bouncing

down the road all the way back toBarcelona.

Even today, if Cruyff makes themost banal remark, it�s treated bythe Catalan people as if it�s a Delphicutterance. Gieling insists that thereis still a naivete about Cruyff andspeculates that his humility isattributable to his background. Hewas 12-years-old when his fatherdied. His mother was forced to work,cleaning the locker rooms at Ajax.

In the mid-1990s, therelationship with Barcelona soured.He was sacked as trainer. The defeatsand setbacks lend pathos to his story.Cruyff now lives in the hills aboveBarcelona and still doesn�t speak aword of Catalan. His gift as afootballer was that he mastered theart of being in the right place at theright time. l (© The Guardian)

A new documentary chronicles Dutchfootballer Johan Cruyff�s legendary

status in Barcelona

Reign in Spain

GEOFFREY MACNAB

TEE BREAKDeepak Acharya

I

D

ABOUT TOWNFESTIVALS AND EXHIBITIONSv Bungadeo Jatra Paintings by Sharada Chitrakar till 15 February at

Siddhartha Art Gallery, BaberMahel Revisited, 4218048v Landscapes, people and places of Ghandruk village etchings and

wood carvings by Caroline Coode and Elaine Marshall till 10 Februaryat the Lazimpat Gallery Café, Lazimpat. 4428549

v Almost Spring Hand-woven Dhaka exhibition, 11AM-4PM on 8February at Rita’s Garden, Patan Dhoka. 10 percent discount.

v Sadhus: The Great Renouncers Photographs by Thomas Kelly from13-29 February at Indigo Gallery, Naxal.

EVENTSv Discovering Buddhism Following the Buddha: The Four Noble Truths

7-8 February Details: 4249270 Email: hbmc@mos.com.npv Rox Bar 3rd Anniversary Party 7 February dance 2PM till 2AM. Free

Entrance. Hyatt Regency Kathmandu, Boudhav Self Reflexology For Your Feet 10AM-12PM on 8 February. Above

Everest Bookstore at Babar Mahal Revisited. Buddha’s Feet, 4425931v Aarohan Theatre Group presents Henrik Ibsen’s A Dolls House at Sama

Natak Ghar, Old Baneshwar. Weekends from 31 January till 14 March.4466956

v Broadway comes to Patan Dhoka American singer Alison Sibleyperforms at Yala Maya Kendra at 5PM on 10 February. Call for passes:5522113, 2110200

MUSICv Not Just the Jazz Bar Chris Masand and The Modern Jazz every Friday

and Saturday night. Shangri-la Hotel, Lazimpat, 4412999v Drummer’s Circle , percussion evening, 7PM on 20 January, Entry Rs

150. All at Moksh, Club Hardic Pulchowk, 5528703

FOODv Love at the Jazz Bar Wine and five course menu

on 14 February. Shangri-la Hotel, Lazimpat,4412999

v Sunny Side Up BBQ lunch with live music Saturdaysand Sundays. The Garden Terrace, Soaltee CrownePlaza Kathmandu. 4273999

v Valentine’s Day Special candlelit evening atDwarika’s Hotel on 14 February. Rs 2,999 percouple. 4479488

v Raclette and Fondue Traditional Swiss table cooking at the Chimney6:30 PM onwards at the Hotel Yak and Yeti, Kathmandu. 4248999

v Cupid’s Spell by the Pond Dinner, a bottle of wine (for couples) anddance through a silver themed 14 February at 1905, Kantipath.Couples: Rs 1,200. Single: Rs 700. 4225272

GETAWAYSv Shivapuri Cottage Dadagaon luxury package of gourmet meals, board

and transport. Highland Travel & Tours, 4253352, 4253053v Golf in the Valley’s last pristine forest. Gokarna Forest Golf Resort &

Spa 4451212

Most of the air we breathed last week was in the “unhealthy” category. Nosurprises there. In Putali Sadak, Patan Hospital and Thamel, theconcentration of small particles of dust less than 10 micros (PM10)were at levels that anywhere else in the world would be consideredunbreathable. If you breathe you die, if you don’t you die. The biggerparticles come from roadside dust, but the finer more harmful ones comefrom diesel emissions and the smoke stacks of brick kilns on the city’soutskirts. Unless we do something about them, we’ll be filling our lungswith these particles.

Good < 60

Ok 61 to 120Unhealthy 121 to 350Harmful 351 to 425

Hazardous >425

What you burn iswhat you breathe.

Patan H Thamel TU Bhaktapur Matsyagaun Putalisadak

Average PM10 levels at selected points in Kathmandu25-31 January in micrograms per cubic meter.Source: www. mope.gov.np

91.2

KATHMANDU AIR QUALITY

22 6 - 12 FEBRUARY 2004 #182CITY

KATHMANDU VALLEY

As this satellite picture taken on Thursdaymorning shows, the Indo-Gangetic fog isnow shrinking bringing some sunshine tothe tarai and inner-tarai valleys. The hillsand mountains have glorious sunshine, andthis pattern will continue during the weekendand coming week since there are no majorwesterly fronts on the horizon. Temperatureis set to climb by a notch with the windsfrom the south. However, this will also bringin the haze that will obscure the sunsomewhat. Frosty mornings for Kathmanduwith hazy sunshine and breezy afternoons.

by MAUSAM BEEDNEPALI WEATHERVIS -05-02-2004 04:00 GMT

BOOKWORM

Courtesy: Mandala Book Point, Kantipath, 4227711, mandala@ccsl.com.np

JAI NEPAL CINEMACall 4442220 for show timings.

www.jainepal.com

Daily 2045-2115 BBC g]kfnL ;]jf

Daily 2245-2300 BBC g]kfnL ;]jf

Get ready for a brand new day with BBC World Today.Every morning on 102.4 FM from 5:45-6:15 AM

Rise and shine

on FM 102.4

Radio SagarmathaP.O. Box 6958, Bakhundole, Lalitpur, Nepal

Tel: ++977-1-545680, 545681,Fax: ++ 977-1- 530227

E-mail: radio@radiosagarmatha.org,www.radiosagarmatha.org /]l8of] ;u/dfyf

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Visit Femilines, the ExclusiveLingerie Store for ladiesundergarments, nightwear, bathrobesand more. Ladies staff. OppositeSajha Yatayat, Harihar Bhawan,Pulchowk. Tel: 547428

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Get 10% exclusive discount on thenormal subscription rate ofHimalmedia’s publications HimalKhabarpatrika, Nepali Times and Wavemagazine. Only at the GrihiniDepartment Store limited, Baluwatar,Phone: 4415186

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19-02 19-02 18-03 18-04 20-03

The Heart Must Break: The Fight for Democracy and Truth in BurmaJames Mawdsley Arrow Books, 2002

Rs 600Within just 10 hours of entering Burma and handing out pro-democracy letters,

James Mawdsley was sentenced to 17 years imprisonment. Undaunted, he used histime in prison to challenge and defy the regime�s lawless assumption of power. Heendured torture, beatings, hunger strikes and over a year in solitary confinement.

This is the compelling account of his four years in and out of Burma.

The journey has ended, and what a ride it’s been. Thethree-picture Lord of the Rings epic is now completeafter three quick years, and it seems like a whirlwind.Return isn’t just a triumph—it’s also a celebration.This film is everything a fan could want and possiblymore. For three-plus hours, it entertains, enthrallsand awes. Its special-effects artistry is astonishing,and its story races to a rousing finish whose finaleputs other trilogies to shame. Without spilling anybeans, be advised that it’s the kind of payoff that makesyou joyous to be a film fan—or could reawaken the fanthat’s been dormant within you after too manyoverheated Hollywood tamashas.

The Lord of the Rings:The Return of the King

236 - 12 FEBRUARY 2004 #182

HAPPENINGS NEPALI SOCIETY

TRAVELLING LIGHT: Ricky Day Angrela(r) and Alain Honeyborene (l)land in Kathmandu on Tuesday, in the course of their microlight worldtour to celebrate the 100 years of aviation. They will be flying overPokhara this weekend.

DIFFERENT FACES: A dancer removes his mask after the religiousprocession for peace oranised in the capital on Wednesday.

GUARD DUTY: Soldiers patrol the empty street in front of SinghaDarbar during the Valley bandh called by the five agitating partieson Monday.

KIRAN PANDAY

KIRAN PANDAY

BIRTHDAY PARTY: Deep Shrestha performs at a tribute to Nepalimusic legends at NTV�s 19th anniversary celebrations on Friday .

MIN BAJARACHARYA

KIRAN PANDAY

FLAG BEARERS: Nepali students in Pune, India at the recentlyorganised week-long �Nepal Festival� to promote Nepali culture andheritage.

is fans think he rocks, butAmrit Gurung of Nepathya isprobably less rock musician

and more fusion artist. He is thatrare breed who can manage ethnicresponsibilities with globalsensibilities. His music could easilyfit into the hip new strains of theBuddha Bar and Café del Marschool along with the world’s bestfusionists.

Purists accuse Amrit forWesternising Nepali music withdrums, electric guitars and rock-stylevocals. But those who feel music,know that no Nepali musician hasever been able to fuse folk elementsinto rock the way he does. His beat,rhythm and singing are all folk.

Amrit owes his musical successto folk songs, especially to gaines(‘Gaines are us’, # 181). As a youngvillage boy in Kaski, his firstencounter with the gaines set Amrit’syoung heart on music. Growing up,he began to question the socialexclusion of the gaines.

Last year, Amrit went to centralNepal to find the best gaines in thecountry. They were brought toKathmandu to participate in theGandharba Festival last week. Forthe first time, young gaines had theopportunity to sing before their rolemodels. “The transfer of skills andcraft from the old to new generationwas heartening to behold,” saysAmrit.

But Amrit and his friends weresaddened by the lack ofKathmandu’s well-known singers,musicians and literary figures

Amrit�s nectar

among the audience. The gaineshad travelled all the way fromtheir home villages to share theirmusic in the city, but Kathmandu’smusicians did not have time tolisten to them.

Amrit originally wanted to be apainter. Two friends, Bhim Punand Deepak Rana, now part ofNepathya, coaxed him intosinging. His first song, Ey MayaTimilai Parkhi Baseko Chhu was

an instant hit in 1991, throwing thespotlight on Nepathya. The last hitResham confirmed his musicaltalent. Amrit’s latest feat was to turna little known mountain songBheda ko Oon Jasto into a popularhit.

Folk music is special to Amritbecause, he says: “Only bypreserving indigenous music canwe save nationalism.” l

(Naresh Newar)

H

MIN BAJRACHARYA

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CDO Regd No. 194/056/57 Lalitpur, Central Region Postal Regd. No. 04/058/59

6 - 12 FEBRUARY 2004 #182

UNDER MY HATKunda Dixit

25 Years Agoost newspapers around the worldhave sections that carry interestingsnippets of news from a decade or so

ago in order that readers get an idea of howmuch progress the country has made, whatgreat strides society has taken, and how everyday in every way we get older and wiser.

In this way, communities and nationspass their collective experiences from onegeneration to another so that another cohort

of adolescents can make the same mistakes allover again. Being the carriers of this nation�sinstitutional memory, we in the mediatherefore take very seriously our public serviceresponsibility of being newspapers of record.This is why we have taken the trouble thisweek of going back in time to pick items ofnews from newspapers of yore thatdemonstrate our laughable early primitivenessand naïvete, and contrast that to theprofessionalism and press freedom that we

enjoy today to publish any ox excrement welike, and get away with it. These arefreedoms that we should defend tooth andnail and never take for granted. Here is aselection of news items from The Rise andShine Nepal, circa February 1979:

PM Thapa sworn inPrime Minister Surya Bahadur Thapa wassworn in today for the second time as primeminister at a function at the royal palace.Speaking to media newspaperpersonsafterwards, PM Thapa said he was workingtowards setting the world record for themost frequent prime minister and pledgedto complete at least five tenures by the dawnof the next millenium. �You will see. I�ll stillbe prime minister in 2004,� he predicted,amidst gales of laughter from the press corps.

Arniko born in NepalA birth certificate belonging to Arniko hasbeen found in a bahal in Thimi,conclusively proving that the famous Nepaliarchitect was in fact born in Nepal and not

in China, as claimed by a Hong Kongnewspaper last week. That report set offprotests in the streets of the capital duringwhich effigies of the Hong Kong paper wereset alight by protestors to ward off the chill.�We never knew he was from Thimi, butnow that we do, we can�t let the Honkiesclaim our national hero,� said one protestor,shouting aggressive slogans.

Their Majesties grace Feu de JoieTheir Majesties graced a feu de joie (Frenchfor �blaze away at the sky�) on the occasion ofShivaratri, observing a grand tradition of theRoyal Nepalese Army in which soldiers lineup along the perimeter of Tundikhel and firetheir muskets aimlessly with wild abandon.The military spokesperson said this year�s fuede joie was �spectacularly successful and asign of things to come�. The army alsoperformed a �Beating Retreat� (English for�marching backwards in a disciplinedmanner�) parade which drew loud applause

and wolf-whistles from onlookers perchedon trees in the vicinity of the Martyr�sMemorial.

Sikkim is SikkimisedIndia today occupied Sikkim, telling theChoegyal to �go take a walk�, officialreports from Gangtok said.

The move was greeted by howls ofprotest from the citizens of that landlockedHimalayan kingdom that has often beendescribed by historians as an olive pipbetween two boulders. Many Sikkimesewere distraught that they would have tostop issuing postage stamps depicting rarewhales, but they were assuaged when toldby New Delhi that their country�s namewould henceforth be immortalised by theOxford Dictionary as an intransitive verbmeaning: �obliterated, wiped out, gobbledup, chomped off, made a part of some-thing bigger, or all of the above�.

HappyValentinesfromWAVE

M

SUBHAS RAI