#24 5 - 11 January 2001 20 pages Rs 20

EXCLUSIVE 69-41 The ruling party’s vicious internal power struggle is now in its final POST-MORTEM round, and the outcome will be decided at the party’s upcoming convention in Pokhara. But before In the 36 hours of mobocracy that ruled that, there was the small matter of Kathmandu’s streets last week, we caught the no-trust vote against Prime Minister Girija Prasad Koirala that a glimpse of an area of darkness in our wannabe Sher Bahadur Deuba country’s soul. wanted to settle first. The vote was set for 28 December, and both BINOD BHATTARAI factions did some grandstanding ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ University. “The government was not there at about secret or open ballot to hide n 26-27 December, Nepal had no a critical moment.” It was only on Wednesday the fact that they were both terrified government. Legitimate political parties afternoon, after things began to get really out o of control that the Prime Minister’s office of losing. cowered, citizens were afraid to speak Both sides met for the duel in out, the capital sank into an anarchic limbo. It began taking stock. The only party that the murky fog-shrouded Singha was all the more shocking because we had showed some sanity was the main opposition Durbar on Thursday morning. The been brought up to believe that things like this UML, which began drafting its now-famous rebels led by Deuba boycotted the weren’t supposed to happen in peaceful Nepal. statement warning people “not to fish in vote when the Koirala camp It won’t be the same again: Nepalis of all muddy waters”. Everyone else—Congress insisted that the voting should be castes, class and ethnicity will hereon be aware factions, the Nine Left, the nationalist Right, open. Allegations of monetary of their physical appearance. Our multi-ethnic the Maoists—were more interested in bending incentives for floor-crossing land which prided itself on “unity in diversity” the violence to suit their agenda. loyalists have been rife. Initially, suddenly descended into politically-inspired Maoist leader Baburam Bhattarai had tribalism. For the first time, Nepalis in the hills fulsome praise for those who took to the who look like they are from the tarai, or streets to protest “Indian expansionism, Nepalis in the tarai who look like they are capitalism and the fascist Koirala clique”. But from the hills were forced to feel like foreigners even he seemed worried about the spectre of in their own land. communal violence: “It is the Indian The government, when it did act, made government that is expansionist, not the things worse. We had an Information Minister Indian working class [i.e. the vegetable

who went on air demanding an apology from vendors, etc, in Nepal].” RAJESH BARAL the actor without confirming whether the As in any post-mortem of a riot of this

MANOHAR RAI statement attributed to him was true. The type, there is no shortage of conspiracy the rebels looked for a way out of leader of the Marxist-Leninist party refused to theories. But there are linkages, and one can the impasse, including discussion believe the actor’s denial. Five young Nepalis work backwards by analysing motive. The first about cabinet positions for were dead, and then the unseemly scramble anti-Hrithik protest occurred in Bharatpur Kathmandu with banners, pamphlets, and the frustrations of the Nepali people fertile dissidents. But by afternoon, when began to capitalise on the fallout. and was reported by the Chitwan Post. It mobs wound up into a frenzy. All government ground for various power centres to cash in it looked like Deuba didn’t have “Last week was one of those times in the spread to Biratnagar, still tense after student- targets were fair game, and businesses were on. Aside from joblessness, inflation and the arithmetic in his favour, he and history of nations when many latent issues police clashes. Kathmandu papers did not start stoned. But the most organised and vicious shortages, ten years of democracy have also his supporters staged a face- converge,” explains Chaitanya Mishra, reporting on it till 22 December. And attacks were on Indian interests. There was an made Nepalis aware of their rights. Without saving walkout. professor of sociology at Tribhuvan despite the government’s attempts to pin outpouring of pent-up anti-Indian feeling policies that address the need of the people to But when the Prime Minister the blame on Spacetime Dainik, that accumulated over the years. The conflagration be heard, grievances pile up. Says another TU returned from his customary bowl paper’s coverage was mild compared to lit the fuse of Pahadi-Madhesi discord. The sociologist Krishna Bahadur Bhattachan: of soup and siesta, Deuba was the vituperative headlines in the other shockwaves from Kathmandu reached the tarai “Our rulers have always used power for addressing a corner meeting for newspapers. towns where there was some retaliatory repression, discrimination, domination, the press. “We didn’t agree By this time, all kinds of left and violence. exclusion and domination of the weak. But because it was to be an open right fringe groups were ready in There were underlying causes that made with growing awareness in the masses and the ballot,” he said. The voting went Maoists politicising them, we could be ahead anyway, and the final Tourism, investment hit heading towards worse problems unless the scores: 69 for Koirala, 41 Deuba rulers mend their ways.” loyalists who walked out, 2 The public had high expectations that democracy would solve some of these issues abstentions and one absent we have to look around before heading out to work.” (Deuba’s mentor, Krishna Prasad The unprecedented The absence of Indian tourists, known for their spending sprees with time, but after a decade of waiting Bhattarai). anti-Indian nature of the Kathmandu riots during their Nepal holiday, will be felt most seriously by shopping centres patience is running out. And there comes a So another brinkmanship last week couldn’t have come at a worse time for Nepal’s and supermarkets, casinos, hotels, restaurants and airlines. Roughly 34 point when all it needs is a seemingly taking us to the edge of an intra- tourism industry and trade. Indian tourists had just started trickling back percent of all tourists in Nepal used to be from India, and this had dropped harmless rumour to set off a chain reaction. after the hijacking one year ago, and trade with India was beginning to by 30 percent even before last week’s riots. The fact that the anti-Indian Political scientist Dev Raj Dahal sees a crisis Congress crisis. The question see a big spurt in Nepal’s favour. Last week could change all that. Indian demonstrations got wide play in the Indian media, especially cable everyone is asking is: wouldn’t it visitors and investors are seriously spooked. Flights from India are nearly television, will not help matters. of confidence between the rulers and the be better to just split the party and empty again, most hotels and casinos are deserted, and Indian business Things are going to be even more devastating for trade. Nepal’s ruled. “There is get it over with? houses which were gearing up to set up manufacturing bases in Nepal in exports to India have registered exponential growth since the new trade a large gap Editorial p2 2001 are now not likely to come. and transit treaty was signed in 1996. Overall trade with India grew by between what Autopsy INSIDE Although the street protests of 26-27 December were indiscriminate, and more than 80 percent in 1998-90, and Nepal’s exports to India have grown political parties Nepali businesses were also stoned, the most vicious and organised attacks an astounding six-fold since 1996. One third of all foreign investment in Bill of women’s rights p4 were against Indians, Indian-owned businesses, Nepalis of Indian origin and Nepal is Indian—there are 164 Indian joint ventures here. If this growth in say their policy is, and what they actually do,” Forever Ambar p10 Madhesis from the tarai. An executive at a Nepal-India joint venture told us: formal trade between India and Nepal is hurt, the only people who will he says. To the social problems add power Nepali World Music p11 “Doing business here was bad enough. Now it has become worse. Security is benefit will be smugglers and back-alley dealers. centres that focus public frustration on scape- deteriorating, government policies are becoming more regressive, and now Nothing Doing p20 (See also: Trade in tatters, p9) goats and you have a recipe for disaster. t EASY TIMES It’s never been easier to subscribe to Nepali Times. Just dial this number 543337 and leave your address. You pay upon delivery of the first issue. 2EDITORIAL 5 - 11 JANUARY 2001 NEPALI TIMES

AUTOPSY An Indian actor doesn’t say something and five people are dead. What would have happened if he had actually said what he is supposed to have said? What does it say about the state of our polity, the psychological state of this country that a harmless rumour which should have been laughed off as a joke, turns deadly serious and picks up a communal flavour? As someone said: “All you need is an ‘ass’ to turn laughter into slaughter.” How fickle is our national pride, how volatile has our society become, that something like this can light the fuse of conflagration. Unknown to most of us, we seem to have imported the insecurity and paranoia that we used to observe south of the border. How rumours of Ayodhya set off carnage across India, how Indira Gandhi’s assassination triggered a pogrom against Sikhs in Delhi. These things weren’t supposed to

happen in peaceful Nepal. The explanation isn’t that Nepalis or Nepali society SUBHAS RAI has changed. (It has. Our value systems and traditional tolerance have been replaced with selfishness, greed and materialism.) But last week’s violence was also an indication of what happens when you mix prejudice with politics. There is latent bigotry and an undercurrent of racism and intolerance in every STATE OF THE STATE by CK LAL society, but it is not until some cold-blooded and calculating politician comes along that society’s hidden vice manifests itself as overt violence. Someone has to stoke the embers, fan the flames, and finally pour oil on it for it to spread. And this looks like what happened in Kathmandu. If you look around there is no shortage of those who would have benefited Beyond borderline insanity by cashing in on the frustration of the public over the incompetence of successive elected governments in the past ten years. Democracy hasn’t just been unable to deliver development, it has also institutionalised corruption, I against my brother law and order has become an everyday problem, joblessness and inflation I and my brother against our cousin has gone out of control. The environment was tinder dry, waiting for a spark. I, my brother and our cousin against the neighbours And as the flames spread, there was no shortage of those who wanted to All of us against the foreigners - Skinhead Scriptures cash in: the Congress factions, the nine leftists, the ultra-right, the Maoists, communal chauvinists. fter Prithvi Narayan Shah created college campuses during the seventies that the complicity of the Chitwan media, who This week we see that ultimately it was never about Hrithik Roshan, it was Nepal by extending the territory of when students’ leaders thundered, “We will first picked up the story, by attributing it to not even about India-Nepal relations, and it threatened to degenerate as we a his tiny Gorkha principality, he faced blow up the Kosi barrage and wash Bihar ‘small-town sensationalism’. However, the had warned last week into a hill-plains rupture within Nepal. If anyone is an even greater challenge. Nepal now into Bay of Bengal” we actually took them complacency of national broadsheets who doing a post-mortem on last week, there is an easy way to figure out who the existed, but how about Nepalis? Forging a seriously. followed up on the story without once architects of the anarchy were. Just ask: who had a motive, who benefited? national identity for such a diverse land was Then reality began to bite. When the double-checking it is unforgivable— Those who want to roll back parliamentary democracy. And who were the more difficult than checking the hegemonic Indians imposed an economic blockade for especially when the infamous interview was losers? The Nepali people. forces of the East India Company. So he almost two years in 1988-89 it suddenly available on the Internet. The national tried to kill two birds with one stone: he dawned on us that ‘hate-India’ was a very media forgot that foolproof rule of ONE STEP FORWARD defined Nepali nationality in terms of fragile foundation of Nepali nationalism. journalism: when in doubt, leave out. distrust of people from the south. Seeds of Anti-Indianism lost some of its charm when Everyone was out to out-scoop the If the Bhutanese refugee groups in Nepal welcomed the agreement of the xenophobia were sown by the founding the neighbour up north refused even moral competition by playing up the story with Tenth Round of the Ministerial Talks last week in Kathmandu, then who father himself. To this day, we see Nepali support during our face-off with India. The inflammatory headlines and sensational are we to be sceptical about it. At first glance, it does look like a nationalism defined usually as anti- resulting economic turmoil hastened the captions. So the whodunit, last week’s breakthrough. Bhutan and Nepal agreed that they would examine Indianism. People’s Movement. deadly farce, still hasn’t been solved. But we documents belonging to the head of families to verify who is a true The Anglophile Ranas continued this During the decade of democracy, no know that there has been a serious rupture refugee, and consider anyone below 25 years old as a member of a policy even though they socialised mostly event captured the fervour of anti- in ethnic relations within the country refugee family. There is now a faint hope that many of the 100,000 with Indians and hired hagiographers, like Indianism of the seventies. Mahakali, caused by a situation that got out of hand refugees languishing in camps in eastern Nepal for the past ten years the rulers had done earlier, to trace their Kalapani, Laxmanpur, IC 814 and even the because of a serious crisis of governance. (17,000 of them were born there in the past decade and have never been ancestry to the royal houses of Rajasthan. Hypothetically, let us examine what to Bhutan) may be able to go back to their homes. As Rakesh Chhetri Over a period of time, this love-hate would have happened if events were allowed argues on p3, the sudden mellowing on the part of the Bhutanese relationship with India got embedded in the to run their course. As the violence psyche of Nepali people. When Ranas were escalated, the army could have taken over overthrown with the help of Indians in the the streets in order to enforce peace. In all spring of 1951, New Delhi came to be probability, this would have happened after regarded with a mixture of fear and hope by the dismissal of the present government on the elite of Kathmandu. charges of incompetence. An even worse King Mahendra exploited the fear when outcome could have been the arrival of he staged a bloodless coup by imprisoning Indian troops supposedly upon the “request the prime minister, dismissing the entire of His Majesty’s Government of Nepal” cabinet and dissolving the first elected because of the threat to “Indians and people parliament of the country in 1960. To of Indian origin in Nepal”. create solidarity around the crown, he Considering such a conspiracy, it instilled the fear of Indians in the masses. doesn’t look very surprising that the rumour For King Mahendra, “we” were those who was spread deliberately, carefully followed supported his Panchayat, all others were A Madhesi and a Pahadi find warmth on a through, and its after-effects well co- “they”—Indians or their stooges. tyre fire in Asan on 27 Dec. ordinated. Protests were too well organised government is directly related to recent international pressure from the Nationalism became the rallying cry of a to be spontaneous. EU, the United States, and Bhutan’s donor consortium. There could also regime that needed India to define itself. scurrilous publication of “Nepal The only consolation is that things be an added element: the slaying last month of ten Bhutanese in Assam Those were also the days when the Gameplan” by the Indian media failed to could have been worse. As a Madhesi who by militants has shocked the country. This is potentially a much more Naxalbari uprising was sweeping eastern rally Nepali people against the Indian state. was repeatedly abused and threatened serious crisis for Thimpu, and has sensitive ramifications for its relations India. In Calcutta, students protested the It appeared as if Nepalis had seen the during the winter of discontent last week, with India as well. Best to get the refugee thing sorted out once and for all Vietnam War. To deflect attention, court futility of fuming at an enemy outside when let me say this: King Prithvi Narayan Shah before it becomes entangled in India’s dangerous northeast. Now the ideologues rediscovered the old bogey of most our real enemies were within. All that did not mean this country to be the real question is how smoothly and quickly will verification happen? It “Indian expansionism” and served it on a was proved wrong by the events of last exclusive domain of any one racial group, should happen ASAP. It is in the interest of neither Himalayan monarchy platter to the Nepali leftists. For the week. Proof is the ‘hate-India’ sentiment, ethnic community, cultural cluster, that the refugee crisis drag on. followers of Naxalbad in Nepal, the Jhapali assiduously cultivated by interest groups for economic class or dominant castes. He communists, Indian expansionism thus decades. That poor Hindi film actor was meant Nepal to be a garden of diversity. became a louder cry than American just an excuse. In all probability whoever The moment that diversity is disturbed, we Nepali Times is published by Himalmedia Pvt Ltd Sanchaya Kosh Building, Block A-4th Floor, Pulchowk, Lalitpur imperialism. Indira Gandhi swallowed up started the rumour knew that the spark had all are doomed. If we can’t hang together in Mailing address: GPO Box 7251, Kathmandu, Nepal Sikkim much later. The fear of Indian a receptive dry hay waiting to catch fire. adversity, we will all be hanged separately Phones: (01) 543333-7 Fax: (01) 521013 expansionism in Nepal predates that event. And how the capital burnt—and continued by forces that do not want to leave us alone Editor: Kunda Dixit This brand of what came to be called to burn even after the statement was or live together. The moral of the story: Desk editors: Deepak Thapa, Samuel Thomas, Anagha Neelakantan Editorial: [email protected] “Mandale-Male” nationalism (an unlikely proven to be false. nationalism that is hatred towards others is Marketing, circulation and subscriptions: [email protected] fusion of extreme-right and extreme-left The media was one of the reasons the self-annihilation. We must build an www.nepalitimes.com Printed at Jagadamba Press (01) 521393 ideologies) was so pronounced on Nepal’s fires refused to abate. It is easy to dismiss inclusive nationalism. t VIEWPOINT 5 - 11 JANUARY 2001 NEPALI TIMES 3

COMMENT by RAKESH CHHETRI

identified by the family head, are refugee problems. The meeting qualified to go home”. This also praised Bhutan’s develop- statement is close to Nepal ‘s ment record. The remarks of the Homeward bound? proposal, although Bhutan has donor community are available on not reacted to Taft’s statement the UNDP website (http:// fter trying since 1993 to try publicly. The official Kuensel www.undp.org.bt/RTM2000/ ato solve the Bhutanese weekly said: “Mr Inderfurth told TM_Report_main.htm ) refugee question, the Kuensel that the US officials In his letters, Bill Clinton’s 10th round of the Nepal-Bhutan now understood better the urged Bhutan to reach an agreement Joint Ministerial Level Committee refugee issue, the steps that were with Nepal to begin the process of has finally made some progress. So being taken to resolve the verification for the repatriation of far, the talks had hinged on the problem, and also appreciated refugees during the Tenth Round in “verification mechanism for the four Bhutan’s concerns.” Kathmandu. If Bhutan fails to agree categories of refugees” and on In its resolution the European to the US proposal, the US has said “harmonising” the position of the Parliament denounced the it would urge multilateral donors to two sides on each of the categories. deplorable situation of Bhutanese divert international aid from For nearly eight years, they had refugees and called on Bhutan, Bhutan to the refugee camps failed even to agree on the jargon Nepal and all other parties through UNHCR. let alone on a common viewpoint involved, to speed up the process The major area of concern on the definition of refugee. of repatriation of refugees to their during the Tenth Round in On a wider geopolitical canvas, RAM PRASAD HUMAGAIN country of origin. Recognising the Kathmandu 25-27 December was the refugee crisis has chilled goodwill of Nepal in accepting the to agree on a “common perspective” relations between the two refugees, the European resolution on the method for verification. In a Himalayan monarchies. If Bhutan’s significantly censured India for major breakthrough both parties uncompromising attitude has pretending the refugee problems as not only agreed to begin the impeded progress, Nepal is to a bilateral issue of concern only to verification process of refugees on blame for agreeing to categorise the There is light at the end of the tunnel for 100,000 Bhutan and Nepal. It urged New the basis of family units, but also refugees. When he was home Delhi to take part in helping agreed to establish a Joint minister, Sher Bahadur Deuba Bhutanese refugees in Nepal as talks in Kathmandu last resolve the refugee issue. Bhutan Verification Team (JFT) by this agreed in July 1993 with his week made progress on verification. rejected both the United Nations week. So there is now a clear road Bhutanese counterpart, Dago and European proposals. map, and this is a big step forward. Tshering, on the categorisation. At home only if they are verified not be able to go back home. This Bhutan and India to speedily During the donor’s The main purpose of the that time, Nepal had no strategy to through the heads of their family. is because the names of 17,000 resolve the issue. The EP passed roundtable in Thimpu in verification process is said to be the bring Bhutan to the negotiation This is the right approach, since children born in the camps and a a second resolution in September November, European and preservation of the family table. Deuba agreed to four Bhutan keeps the census and land large number of refugee youth who 2000. The UN Human Rights Japanese diplomats are said to integrity—families will not be categories of refugees: records of its citizens in the name of got evicted in their childhood along Sub-Commission also issued two have expressed serious concern broken up. The basics of the • forcefully evicted bonafide the head of the family. Refugees with their parents prior to 1995 are statements for early repatriation on the refugee issue and the repatriation process on the four Bhutanese; need to be identified and verified not recorded in the census register of Bhutanese refugees in 1998 discrimination against Nepali- categories of refugees are a • voluntarily emigrated Bhutanese through heads of the family on the of Bhutan. and 1999. speaking Lhotshampas. The downstream process. (a term Bhutan conveniently basis of citizenship cards and other As mediator, the UNHCR has Today, that Bhutan is under Austrian representative at the The Bhutanese delegation uses for those who signed documents such as land and house- suggested a formula to break this increased international pressure is meeting said that the issue of also promised that all valid migration forms under duress); hold tax paid receipts. stalemate on verification: the unit evident from the resolution of the “economic refugees” in the documents possessed by refugees • non-Bhutanese; and Bhutan is not willing to take of verification should be the nuclear European Parliament in context of Europe should not be will be checked by the • Bhutanese who have committed back all the refugees, and insists family, including unmarried young September, concern expressed by confused with the “status of verification team. This is criminal acts. that verification be done by people up to the age of 25, and donors at the Round Table minorities” (like Lhotshampas) important since a large number of Nepal is now convinced that interviewing individual refugees, elderly relatives and identification Meeting of the Bhutan aid residing in the country for many refugees possess documents issued the over 100,000 refugees, 17,000 which is a cumbersome process. If through family heads. Nepal agreed, consortium held in Thimphu from years and respecting its to them by the Bhutanese of whom have been born in the Bhutan’s demand is accepted, then but Bhutan rejected this 7-9 November. leadership and the government. government. The Tenth Round camps, will be able to go back more than half of the refugees will compromise. The much overdue American Bhutan should follow a policy of has set the right tone and cleared It is quite apparent that the attention and concern about the inclusion to gain long-term the first hurdle. Had Bhutan progress made in Kathmandu last Bhutanese refugee issue came economic, social and political played its traditional delaying week was due to mounting through the proposal of the field. The Danish participant tactics this time also or if it international pressure which Assistant Secretaries of the US expressed concern over the creates problems in the verifica- compelled Thimpu to search for a State Department for South Asia discriminatory policies against tion process in future, it will compromise. The Bhutanese Karl Inderfurth and the Bureau Lhotshampas which included surely invite international refugee issue was getting of Population, Refugees and denial of citizenship identity intervention, which will not be in RAM PRASAD HUMAGAIN internationalised through the Migration Julia Taft who visited cards, government employment its best interests. The challenge refugees’ own efforts, since they Nepal and Bhutan in December. and trade licences. The Dutch for the international community knew that only support from the Taft’s proposal was to “identify stressed freedom of expression, now is to monitor that the world community would be able the refugees and the head of a press and organisation for verification process is fair and to make a difference. Nepal came nuclear family, who would then conflict resolution, and added equitable and to keep continuous to the scene at a much later stage. identify the members of his/her that such things did not pressure on Bhutan until all The first major breakthrough in family. Having agreed upon this, necessarily go against Bhutan’s refugees can go back home. t internationalising the issue they could proceed on with an consensus culture. The Japanese happened with the European actual verification process and representative at the roundtable (Rakesh Chhetri is a Parliament (EP) resolution in determine which of the four said that his country believed in Bhutanese political analyst. March 1996 urging Nepal, categories of the nuclear family, a fair and equitable solution of [email protected])

LETTERS HRITHIK be able to defeat the forces which are hundreds of rupees, and my faith has regular columnist Kunda Dixit Your story “It’s not about Hrithik bent upon destroying the very fabric constitutional, the been rewarded because every time, has a good sense of humour, CK in the past ten years of politicians anymore” (#23) compels me, as an of Nepali life and culture. nomination of without fail, my packages have Lal writes splendidly. Wish you who would otherwise find no chance Indian, to be worried. The question, Naveen Kumar members to the reached their destinations. Only on would make your crossword easier! of entering the House, and even which immediately springs to my Kathmandu National Assembly. one occasion has my mail returned, Dr Sabin Ranabhat those of dubious character, have mind, is: “Was it about Hrithik at The Constitution but the fault lay with the US Postal Pokhara been nominated. As constitutional all?” During the last two days, I have Such a fuss over a small remark by a states: “Ten Service. We all have our litany of monarch, the king is above partisan been witness to a senseless nobody called Hrithik. Why are we members to be complaints, but we must also I very much enjoyed reading the politics. Shouldn’t his nominees also outpouring of violence targeted at making him so important? When our nominated by His acknowledge honest, diligent work, piece in your Daily Online be the same? the Indian community. All for an own prime minister speaks to Nepalis Majesty from particularly when people are working Edition on the Maoist insurgency S Grimaljee alleged remark which Hrithik in Hindi, why can’t an Indian actor amongst persons of for a pittance and the temptation to “Journey to Maoland” (#23). I was Kathmandu vehemently denies he ever made. express (if indeed he did) his high reputation be dishonest can often seem justified. carried away by the way Sudheer He has only been made a negative views about Nepal? If an who have rendered Bhim Gurung Sharma narrated his travels. scapegoat. I wonder why the Indian minister had made that prominent service THANKS, MR POSTMAN Sanepa Keep those stories coming. remark, it may have been S Prasai perpetrators of the violence did not in various fields of In view of eight long years of TIMES OF NEPAL stop to think that even if Hrithik said understandable to make an issue out national life.” The excellent service at the Lalitpur post Gaborone, Botswana what he was rumoured to have said, of it. But over a remark by a film star? supposition that office, I feel obliged to come to the When I first stumbled on Nepali doing what they did would only Shailja Pradhan adequate defence of the Nepali postal service Times, I thought it was yet another Our local hat collector shouldn’t confirm his views. The only logical via Internet representation of (#23) and the many faceless, poorly paper in the pile. Going through it have a hard time writing a humour column for this issue. conclusion is that they did not want CONSTITUTIONAL? certain interests will paid employees who continue to later, I found every article carefully to: they wanted to go ahead and not be possible provide a vital service in the days of crafted and minutely edited. There Just recount the week’s events, as have their party. Senseless violence Shiva Gaunle’s praise of the king’s through the competitive system of mobile phones and the internet. I seems to be a lot of effort in the this week has been a farce in does not lead anywhere. A nation constitutional role is well deserved election. Does this not imply that have never insulted an employee by whole making of the newspaper. It has itself. If only it weren’t so tragic. that ceases to think ceases to grow. I (“Thirty years of King Birendra’s reign” those nominated should be of non- demanding that he/she cancel become a solace for a reader like U Thapa only hope that better sense will #23). However, there is one aspect of political or non-partisan nature? stamps in my presence on my mail me tired of reading politicised via Internet prevail and the Nepali people will his role which has not been strictly There have been a number of cases even when they added up to propaganda-filled papers. Your 4NATION NEPALI TIMES Women, rights, and5 - 11 JANUARY the 2001

new acts and court rulings social values are changed enjoy inheritance rights only so long remain stubbornly uncommitted suddenly.” as they remain single. Widows who to granting women legal This awkward ruling did force re-marry must return their first equality. One part of the an apathetic Parliament to finally husbands’ inheritance. Married and Constitution states: “No do something about gender unmarried daughters are treated discrimination shall be made discrimination in the Muluki Ain, unequally as heirs. In cases of against any citizen in the but it also set up the Supreme bigamy, daughters of second wives application of general laws on Court as the guardian of the are discriminated against. Women grounds of religion, race, sex, (patriarchal) Nepali social order. are granted no maintenance from caste, tribe or ideological Women’s rights advocate Sapana their husbands during divorce conviction .” But lawmakers in Pradhan Malla, who represented proceedings which can take years. Parliament and in the courts are Dhungana in court, argues that And women are granted no right to loath to address the the ruling was confusing. “How stay in their maternal homes in discrimination in that very can discriminatory laws be cases of domestic violence. “The document, and in the Muluki changed without affecting the bill still defines women’s rights Ain Civil Code, an often- patriarchal order?” Malla asks. based on their marital status,” anachronistic code which, in Other women’s rights activists Malla argues. “There is no compliance with Hindu law, are unified in criticising the Court’s recognition that women should holds women below men. It’s a conservatism. But the Supreme enjoy equal rights through all stages tribute to the small and Court is not the only conservative of their lives.” overworked group of women’s force. In complying with the court The conditional legalising of rights activists that the present order, the Ministry of Law, Justice abortion is another contentious

MIN BAJRACHARYA bill has even made it to and Parliamentary Affairs submitted aspect of the women’s bill. Again, The government is organising seminars to discuss the Parliament. the 11th Muluki Ain Amendment Malla expresses reservations about The first movement towards Bill—“the women’s bill”—in 1997. what is missing. A married woman new women’s bill “at the grassroots”. But women’s such a bill began in 1995, when The bill betrays a reluctance to may abort a foetus within 12 rights activists are unhappy with the process and the lawyer Meera Dhungana filed a recognise women and men as equal. weeks—but only with her writ petition at the Supreme It almost seems designed to foil husband’s consent. In cases of provisions of the bill. Court asking that the term serious efforts for women’s equal incest and rape, and if the birth will “son” in Clause 16 of the Muluki rights. cause mental or physical harm to MANJUSHREE THAPA

○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ possibly largest seminar taking good people will prevail in these Ain’s inheritance law be repealed The bill addresses a mishmash the woman or the child, the n the last days of 2000, the place in Kathmandu. “The seminars.” as it discriminates against of important issues, of which window is extended to 18 weeks. government made an seminars are primarily concerned Manju Thapa is more blunt: daughters. Current inheritance inheritance rights comprise a But unmarried, widowed and iunprecedented move: the with the inheritance rights “Why seek a popular vote only for laws allow a woman to inherit major and contentious part. married but abandoned women will Parliament’s Law and Justice provisions in the bill, the subject a bill on women’s rights? Other paternal property only if she is Among other provisions, the bill still be denied abortion rights. “The Committee sent the 11th Civil of the greatest disagreement and equally important bills, like the over 35 and unmarried. By stipulates that: majority of women presently jailed Code Amendment Bill, debate,” states MP Madhukar. citizenship bill, weren’t put contrast, all men over 18 enjoy • daughters be named equal for abortion won’t be helped by this informally known as the “Our aim in conducting them is through this process. The the right to inherit paternal heirs of parental property; bill,” Malla states. “Those who “women’s bill”, for discussion to to gather a popular vote on the committee’s members would rather property in Nepal’s prevailing • women receive part of their most need abortion legalised won’t the grassroots level. Five teams bill.” see this bill fail than succeed, and system of angsha, or birthright husbands’ property before benefit at all.” headed by MPs from different None of the prominent so they’re preparing the grounds to inheritance. divorce; The rest of the bill proposes parties were set up to conduct women’s rights activists has been reject even the limited rights it The Supreme Court issued a • current age restrictions for changes in the areas of divorce, seminars in 14 districts (one for invited to the seminars so far grants women.” ruling wrought with ambiguity. widows to claim their rape, succession, adoption and each zone) on the controversial (though the Women’s Security Drastically varying results It agreed that Clause 16 husbands’ property be sentencing. Some of its provisions bill. According to Committee Pressure Group is trying, on its could emerge from biased target discriminated against women, removed; and are positive: rape cases are to be Chairperson MP Mahendra own initiative, to attend as many groups and flawed methodologies. but declared that repealing it • time and age restrictions for tried in closed camera courts, with Madhukar, the teams will solicit as possible). It is but natural that What do the questionnaires to be would grant women dual rights married women to claim their female police officers handling opinions from approximately 60 they find many reasons to feel used in the seminars ask? MP to inherit their parents’ and husbands’ property be victims. Sentences in rape cases are chosen individuals at each sceptical. Is this a manoeuvre Madhukari says, “That information husbands’ properties, and thus removed. increased. Significantly, seminar, including district, aimed at removing the bill’s won’t be released beforehand. To discriminate against men. The The bill also facilitates some paedophilia, which lacks a law of municipality and VDC officials, inheritance rights provisions? Says do so would be like leaking test Court ordered Parliament to aspects of the implementation of its own, has been encompassed by members of women’s NGOs, Shanta Thapaliya, “This is not questions.” submit a “just” bill within one laws. But many activists, the bill’s provisions on rape. The women in local government, and unlikely. I’d like to be positive There are fair grounds to year, but went on to state that including Malla, voice age of consent for marriage has other significant personalities. about MPs taking initiative on question the government’s fancy changing current laws “could reservations about the bill’s been raised to 18 for women and The seminars were slated to start women’s rights. There is much footwork. Eleven years after affect the patriarchal order” of oversights. For instance, women 20 for men. And the sentence for on 31 December in Jhapa and conservatism in those involved, democracy, the Constitution, the Nepal. The Court explained: must return paternal inheritance bestiality has been equalised for last ten days, with the final and but maybe, by some luck, some Muluki Ain Civil Code, and even “Society cannot accept it when upon marriage—in effect they both men and women (previously,

HERE AND THERE by DANIEL LAK contortionist. There is an eclectic assortment of music and speech on the in-flight audio network, but you can’t hear it over the roar of the engines. And the Cabbage class movies can’t be seen properly, either on the distant bulkhead screen or the silly little thing on the seat in front of you covered with greasy fingerprints because some genius of a designer decided that a touch tone control system would amuse passengers. No point in mentioning the toilets as you can never get in to them anyway Probably just as well; most older aircraft have what’s known as “gravity” flush system that seems to indicate that the plane was flying upside down when most people used the toilet. Then Krabi, Thailand - Robert Louis Stevenson famously wrote that to Travelling is not better than there’s the landing, usually announced well after the aircraft has travel hopefully is better than to arrive. Clearly, these are the words of plummeted a few thousand metres amid strange roaring noises from a man who has never experienced the ordeal of air travel. Aside from arriving: its impossible to do the wings and general spillage of drinks. In Pakistan, the the fervent wish that the plane lands and takes off safely, and stays aloft announcement is “God willing, we shall soon be landing.” A friend in between, where is the hope in air travel? Much of it seems designed either with equanimity. wryly pointed out once that the event of landing itself was not where to emphasise that the traveller is unimportant to the airline, the we needed the help of the almighty. It was in the manner of landing, authorities who designed the airport, and the functionaries who class check-in look suspiciously like bread lines in depression-era preferably softly and right side-up. regulate the flow of people from country to country. Oklahoma or the old Soviet Union. The departure experience, right down to the rapacious crook who The experience begins with the taxi ride from home, the insistence And as for the experience after that, at least in Nepal there’s drives the taxi, is repeated faithfully upon arrival. Why are immigration by all but the most humane of drivers that the metre is hopelessly out nothing to tempt me to spend any money. I’ve already bankrupted officers always surly? Perhaps it’s the constant procession of grumpy, of date and airport runs always cost more, and you’re leaving anyway, myself to buy the ticket, I don’t need to buy any pashmina shawls, malt uncomfortable passengers, fresh from cabbage class, and not looking so dig deep and drop all your local currency into his willing palm. The whisky or sushi. A departure lounge without a Body Shop, Harrods or forward to the fleecing they’re about to get from the taxi driver. So, departures area is next. Kathmandu isn’t the worst of them, Delhi is, booze vendor would suit me fine. None of this compares with the sheer apologies to Mr Stevenson, travelling hopefully is not better than arriving: but Nepal doesn’t compare too unfavourably. That long queue at the x- agony of the flight itself. Again, I emphasise that, as a man of the its impossible to do either with equanimity. Unless, of course, you pay ray machine, the RNAC clerks who take forever to produce a boarding people, I am talking about economy class travel. Those in the know the absurd sums required to fly club class where any liberal principles of pass and the luggage man who attaches the tag and then insists on a refer to the seats in the back of the aircraft as cabbage class. They’re equality are jettisoned as blithely as the contents of an aircraft septic gratuity to lug your bag two metres to the conveyor belt. Things aren’t not far wrong. The seats are too close together. Relaxation, let alone tank. Next time, I’m going by ship, a trifle difficult from Nepal perhaps, much better in London or New York where the queues for economy sleep, requires the assumption of a position that would challenge a but perhaps someone could dig us a canal from the Bay of Bengal. t NATION 5 - 11 JANUARY 2001 NEPALI TIMES 5

Nepal-Bhutan talks inch ahead

○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ Nepal and Bhutan have finally taken a step forward towards Bill resolving the refugee problem involving about 100,000 people. Last week the two sides agreed to form a joint verification team (JVT) for “validating of family women bore greater relationship as well as verification punishment). Yet in many of of the status of the people in the these issues, Malla points out refugee camps”. The JVT is to visit oversights: for example, the bill the camps this month to make fails to define rape more broadly “logistical, security and other than vaginal penetration. arrangements”. This basically The present bill touches on MIN BAJRACHARYA means that work will begin to see if very few of the 54 separate the people in the camps are discriminatory laws in the actually Bhutanese evicted from Constitution and in the Muluki their homeland—as Nepal has Ain which are identified by the been maintaining—or economic Forum for Women, Law and whether to support it. Manju Thapa amendment at all. How long will it says quite confidently, “Yes, I migrants—as Bhutan claims. Development report. Even some feels that activists needn’t bother take for the redrafted “women’s believe it will.” “There may be delays over Parliamentarians criticise it as lobbying to pass this bill in its bill” to be tabled for voting? “To And if the redrafted bill technical matters but this is a step conservative: over 70 amendment present state—it is preferable to send this bill to Parliament in a contains no new provisions for forward,” says Gyan Chandra Acharya, spokesman at the proposals have been submitted on work for a bill that unambiguously timely fashion is our main inheritance rights? Thapaliya is Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The plan is to verify refugees as it to date, including proposals by grants women equal inheritance responsibility,” says Madhukar. So quick to answer: “Let’s see what members of a family group for those up to the age of 25. Those MPs of the CPN (UML) and other rights. Others feel that the bill is at it will be tabled in the upcoming the committee does. We are also above 25 will be dealt with individually. For verification purposes left parties who hold, among other least the beginning of a long session? After a pause, Madhukar prepared to respond.” t any papers proving Bhutanese citizenship will suffice. things, that women should not struggle, and that it must be The Ministerial Joint Committee (MJC) had only one agenda return inherited paternal property supported as such. “We should lend during the talks that lasted three days: to determine the upon marriage. As for the Nepali it our conditional support,” says mechanism for verifying the refugees. Nepal insisted on taking Congress party, which is Malla. “But we must continue the family as the unit—because many refugees who came in as responsible for drafting the bill, it working for other important rights minors and also those born in the camps don’t have the has never been in a rush to take up which it leaves undone.” necessary papers—while Bhutan held on to screening all the issue of women’s equal rights. In fact most women’s rights individuals. The two governments were silent on what to do with Equal inheritance rights have activists are not focussing on this bill refugees not living in the camps. always been the rallying cry of the but on other efforts, like following From here the refugee problem moves towards other, left. A will system, which would be through with the Convention on the perhaps more contentious, issues such as classifying them into an obvious alternative to Nepal’s Elimination of All Forms of four categories as agreed in October 1993—bona fide birthright system of angsha Discrimination Against Women. Bhutanese evicted forcefully, Bhutanese who immigrated, non- inheritance, is sporadically raised Ratified without reservation by Bhutanese people and Bhutanese who have committed criminal by non-left leaders, but they’ve Nepal in 1991, this convention acts. displayed no initiative in discussing ostensibly provides legal avenues to Nepal and Bhutan did not meet for seven months after the this option seriously. overturn discriminatory national last meeting but Foreign Ministry officials say they noticed a A recent study by the Forum laws. marked change in the Bhutanese attitude towards the refugee for Women, Law and Meanwhile, MP Madhukar says issue. That was partly a result of pressure from donor nations Development shows that women the suggestions gathered by the five like the US and the EU. The European Parliament’s resolution in are clamouring for change: 95 teams will be compiled into a September was the most scathing: it said Bhutan had delayed percent of the women interviewed report, which will then be finding a resolution to the problem and ruled that the people in felt that existing property laws considered by the committee as it the camps were victims of arbitrary deprivation of nationality and discriminated against them; 90 redrafts the 11th Muluki Ain forcible eviction. “Shocked by the sudden and arbitrary” percent felt the same way about Amendment Bill. There is nothing resolution, which it said was “highly partisan, unsubstantiated citizenship, marriage and divorce to prevent this process from and ill-timed,” Bhutan wrote to the EC saying that the bilateral laws; and 60 percent felt that laws dragging on for months, or even process was close to reaching a solution. related to legal and court years. Many activists feel the In the past Bhutan squarely put the blame for delays on the proceedings were discriminatory. government is simply acting in bad frequent changes on government in Nepal. In the same note And as the “women’s bill” goes all faith, at best trying to pass only Bhutan also said the origins of many people were in question as over the country for discussion, token amendments, or at worst to they cannot be separated from “the hundreds of thousands of activists must ask themselves endlessly delay the passing of any wandering people in the region who have been displaced by demographic, environmental and economic circumstances in Nepal.” The verification process could shed light on this issue.

Hearings on pork barrel funds begin

○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ The Supreme Court has begun looking into a petition seeking the cancellation of Electoral Constituency Development Programme funds which MPs have been spending on projects of their choice. MPs gets Rs 1 million each every year to be used at their discretion. The petition was filed by the self-styled anti- corruption activist Bharat Jangam, who was also successful in getting the Court to order the cancellation of pensions for former MPs a few weeks ago. The petitioner argues that the funds from the central coffers are used to fund partisan projects.

Winter mountaineering round-up

○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ Only four climbing expeditions decided to try their luck in the Nepali Himalaya this winter. Five climbers from the Himalayan Guide Winter Amadablam Expedition and three from the Jagged Globe Winter Amadablam Expedition reached the summit of Mt. Amadablam in the first week of December. Two members of a Korean expedition also made the summit of the 6812m peak the same week. A10-member Polish International Makalu Expedition is presently attempting to climb the world’s fifth highest peak considered by many the most formidable and inspiring mountain in the Himalaya. Expedition leader Krzysztof Wielicki will attempt a repeat ascent on the 8463m peak. “Wielicki is attempting the west pillar, a seldom tried route. It is exceedingly difficult, a very steep pillar,” says Kathamndu-based mountaineering correspondent Elizabeth Hawley. Wielicki, one of the first group of climbers to accomplish a winter ascent of Everest, is the fifth person to summit all 14 eight thousand-metre peaks in the world. Seven people have climbed the world’s 14 eight-thousand metre peaks since Reinhold Messner managed the feat in 1986. “One other person claims to have done all fourteen. But one ascent is not confirmed,” says Hawley. 6NATION 5 - 11 JANUARY 2001 NEPALI TIMES Banking on social responsibility

SAGAR SJB RANA private investors. The decline of a provision in the management ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○n 30 September, 2000, NBL is in part linked with this contract to ensure that the less Nepal Rastra Bank transfer, and it vividly showed profitable branches or even those o running at loss, should remain in (NRB) issued a notice that parastatals operating under in The Economist seeking government control can actually operation. These branches can proposals from applicants become less efficient after they continue to be subsidised by the wanting to take over two are handed over to the private profit of other branches. The “state-owned” banks, Nepal Bank Ltd (NBL) and Rastriya Banijya Bank (RBB), on Nepal Bank Ltd made steady progress management contracts. The under joint ownership: majority share government had decided to holdings and management controlled by hand over the management of the banks to firms with banking the government, and only a minority experience, a move based on, share held by private sector investors. and influenced by, a report of And this occurred despite having to serve KPMG Barnet which declared the two banks to be the needs of remote areas. “technically insolvent”. So far, 41 firms are said to have sector. But the other reason for responsibility of providing submitted applications for the the decline of NBL is the entry banking services in less affluent contract, and the government is Some banks are more equal than others. If private banks of new commercial banks which and remote areas should be shared preparing to hand over one of all flock to choice areas, who is going to provide banking are not bound by the condition by all commercial banks. the banks by April 2001. that they have to provide credit Why should the remote and

This rapid development is services in remote underdeveloped districts? to the less-profitable remote needy areas of the country be ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ in line with the policy of ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ areas of the country. This deprived of essential services such privatisation of government- minded pursuit of liberalisation, in the world that is profitable.” but a few districts of the burden was confined to as banking? Providing basic owned entities adopted some voices of caution have been This is quite incorrect. Nepal country. government-owned banks while services to neglected areas may ten years ago. In the past two trampled. Responsible people are Bank Ltd in fact made steady That was until 1995-96 when new banks could choose prime work out to be much cheaper for or three decades, liberalisation, making extremely subjective progress under joint ownership: the government transferred a areas of business and skim the the government in the long term globalisation and privatisation statements not backed by facts, majority share holdings and part of its NBL shares to the cream of profitability. than buying arms and ammunition have become the mantras of the and these are often headlined by management controlled by the private sector, effectively This is not an argument to quell the ongoing insurgency. t Reagan-Thatcher free-market the media. One such statement government, and only a minority abandoning its controlling against privatisation per se. But (Sagar SJB Rana is President of the doctrine strongly pushed by the illustrates this market share held by private sector majority holdings. The if the decision-making Nepali Congress Lalitpur District industrialised countries and its fundamentalism. The CEO of a investors. And this occurred appointment of the chair and the authorities, in their wisdom, see Committee. He is Secretary General of local advocates in many leading international bank despite having to serve the needs majority of the directors, until no other alternative to handing the Centre for Consolidation of developing countries. Nepal is recently pontificated thus: “There of remote areas through then the preserve of the over management to private Democracy and was a Director of no exception, and in its single- is no government bank anywhere expansion of branches covering all government, was now handled by bidders, there should at least be Nepal Bank Ltd, 1980-88.)

BARBS by BARBARA ADAMS Kathmandu, 27 December 2000 hose who have been complaining that they never see news of Nepal There is unspoken relief that at last the festering sore of t when in foreign lands because the press seems to have lost interest must be relieved. Nepal last week projected its new image into

the living rooms around the world. Was it Nepal that we saw on the discontent has burst and the pus has started to run out. ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○

BBC: images of stone throwing youths, being attacked by police in riot ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ gear, and chaotic streets full of rubble and burning tyres? Or was that as anything burnable belonging to the Government, including cars rights excesses, corruption, and lack of real justice inherited from the Gaza? Alas, it was our own once-tolerant and gentle people engaged in and buses. Panchayat system, all of which were well documented in the Malik an anti-Indian rampage— all provoked by a carelessly reported (and The next day, early in the morning, His Majesty King Birendra is and Rana reports. Instead they allowed, or even facilitated, appalling now reportedly never uttered) reported to have driven alone, without any security or any previous and all-pervasive increase of almost all the aberrations of the regime slur against Nepal by one of India’s young movie icons. notice, to the scene of the previous nights rampage. Profoundly shocked they had supposedly overthrown. So much so that today, there a Somehow during those fraught three days my mind kept going back by this culmination of several days of raging student and other popular nostalgic longing for the redictability and security of the “good to the student riots in 1979 which were directly responsible for the discontent, His Majesty almost immediately announced old days”. holding of the referendum to decide if the country wanted a Panchayat the holding of a referendum so that the public could vote on whether And so, after about ten years of “demo-crazy”, devoid of real system ”with suitable reforms” (which never came, by the way, and they wanted the present Panchayat system “with suitable reforms” or an progress in providing jobs for the youth and basic needs for the therefore the Jana Andolan) or a multi-party system which came partly actual multi-party system. (Popular reaction had soon changed from poor, an attempt of students to protest a seemingly non-existent because instead of “suitable reforms” the country got greed and shock at Bhutto’s demise to loud demands for multi-party democracy.) insult to Nepal by an Indian actor, and the usual police corruption, and scandal We all know what happened next: an allegedly rigged referendum, a over-reaction has again erupted, to nobody’s surprise, into full-scale after scandal. leap in corruption and scandals, and then, about ten years later, the Jana street battles. The new and troubling element in the present conflict The 1979 riots, like the riots last week, started at Amrit Science Andolan and the restitution of the supposedly much-longed-for multi- is its specific targeting of Things Indian. College (ASCOL) and were sparked by an innocuous procession of party system. Within weeks after the Interim Government was formed, Whether or not we like Indian Government policy towards students who were attempting to present a petition to officials at the the young were complaining that there were no signs of the change that Nepal, we all have Indian friends and we were acutely embarrassed by Pakistan Embassy to protest the hanging of Zulfikar Ali Bhutto. The their friends the violence directed at them. We must not forget, however, that it police overreacted. There was a lathi charge and several students were had died to bring. They were aware of the tripartite agreement which has been the policy of successive Nepali governments, starting with injured. The next day student-police clashes spread like wildfire all restricted intrinsic and positive change in the system, but could not the Panchayat era, to encourage Indian economic presence in Nepal. over the valley. Rumours about police throwing students out of the accept the extent to which things remained the same, even worsened, Aside from the anti-Indian activities of some of the rioters, much college windows spread like wildfire, and before one was really aware under the new, supposed “democracy”. was deja vu. The sirens of police vans and ambulances, the wild of what was happening real flames were shooting up in the centre of People soon began to refer to the new regime as, “the multi-party rumours, the vagueness of the numbers killed and injured. There is Kathmandu. Panchayat system”. It retained much of the old mentality and apprehension everywhere in Kathmandu about the future, but also a The flames and the clouds of smoke rose into the darkening sky. many of the old anti-democratic laws, but lacked the Panchayat sort of unspoken relief that at last the festering sore of discontent has The students had set fire to the Gorkhapatra Santhan, RNAC as well experience in governing. It did not address and/or punish the human burst and the pus has started to run out. t 7 NATION Keeping warm 5 - 11 JANUARY 2001 NEPALI TIMES

SALIL SUBEDI ○○○○○○○○○○○ ○○○○○ The sahuji swears he’s selling you an “original” heater. epal has already imported

nelectric, kerosene and LPG Soon, you’re swearing at him—your room is still freezing. heaters worth Rs 100 ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ million this year from Malaysia, ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ China, Taiwan, Korea, Japan, Salesmen insist that the heat respiratory problems. People widely-bought—fakes. Devendra Italy, Spain and Germany. Add to generated by one of these lasts dislike the smell of LPG and Jiv Tuladhar, a heater dealer in MIN BAJRACHARYA this the untracked imports of the “long after the heater has been worry about an explosion. As for Mahaboudha, says, “They come little Indian electric heaters, turned off.” electric heaters, the low-end ones with big tags that say JAPAN and you start to get an idea of Electric heaters are growing can be unsafe, and electricity is PRODUCE or MADE IN JAPAN.” how warm this country needs in popularity and there are expensive. Really expensive. Increased demand and to be kept. different kinds. Leave the Indian So how do you choose? First, competition over the last five Kerosene heaters have been and Nepali coil heaters to make decide what kind of aggravation years have spurred Nepali traders the choice of heating in the tea and noodles in office you can handle. Then make a to go to the Guanxao area in middle-class market for nearly a kitchens. They cost only Rs 200, budget, taking into account your China, also called “electric the wrong direction and the use of decade now, mainly because but consume an amazing amount initial investment, how long you town”, and order cheaper cold-retaining materials like marble they’re affordable and portable. of electricity and pose many need to run your heater every day, products. Unfortunately, here, anonymity, “People have to come for floors is rampant. It’s fashion- The most popular brands are the safety hazards. A serious electric and operating and maintenance no-name=no-quality. Other ways and ask to change their billing able to construct big concrete Korean Kerona, the Chinese heater could be a fan heater (Rs costs. For instance, it’s important to tell a fake are checking to see system.” All very strange, but blocks,” says Marahattha. World and Lucky Star, and the 1,500-4,000), a storage heater to know that an hour’s use of a the wick-holder is stable, looking worth a shot. But there are ways to make Japanese Fujica, priced anywhere with heat conduction segments kerosene heater costs Rs 5 on for chromium-plated rods and a Architects and energy experts even a concrete block warmer. If between Rs 2,200 and Rs 9,000, (Rs 10,000-15,000), an electric average, an LPG heater also Rs 5, well-printed catalogue. insist that all the heaters in the you don’t have as many south- depending on where you buy oil heater that uses thermal oil and an electric heater anywhere As for the high electricity world won’t keep you as warm as facing windows as you’d like, them and how “original” they are. radiation (Rs 10,000-13,000), or between Rs 6 and Rs 12. Then tariffs, there might be a way out. cheaply as smart planning and double-curtain the north-facing They’re usually round—it’s a fast-warming convector heater there’s the issue of maintenance. In winter, power consumption construction can. Says Pandey, ones. Even thin cotton and rush almost like sitting around a fire— (Rs 5,500-6,000). Most electric Space heater technicians say that shoots up almost 20 percent from “We haven’t incorporated the mats help if you have concrete or, and radiate heat in all directions. heaters are 2,000-watt devices, the instruments would work more 300MW to 350MW. NEA concept of conserving ambient heaven forbid, marble floors. which means every hour of use efficiently and last longer if they authorities say it’s difficult to temperature in rooms.” Architect Insulate rooms and seal cracks in adds Rs 12 to your electricity were treated better. stop people using electricity Punya Sagar Marahattha, theory doors and windows with cotton bill. All of this sounds like during the peak hours, 5-9 pm. lecturer at the Engineering College, and scotch tape. If that doesn’t Three years ago, LPG- common sense, but make sure you But as energy expert Bikash agrees: “Windows and doors are in help, buy a heater. t powered heaters from Europe clean your heater before putting Pandey says, “Electricity is a started making their appearance it away and keep it away from the high-quality energy—for Nepal it here. You can smell the gas and dust in the summer. Though the makes sense to use Time of Day they hiss a bit, but they heat very temptation to huddle close to a (ToD).” fast. As long as you can keep heat source as you eat, drink and ToD is a billing option that yourself in cylinders, you can be merry is strong, try to avoid doesn’t just count the units used, keep warm. spills. Keep any grease-able parts but also keeps track of the time Each of these heating systems such as wicks greased, or you’ll of day they’re used, and off-peak comes with its own set of find yourself paying Rs 250 for a use is charged at a lower rate. problems that strain your budget, replacement. It also helps to buy The NEA has recently started health or the environment. as close to the “original” as offering the facility, but following Kerosene heaters give out toxic possible. Chinese-made some arcane logic, there’s been no carbon monoxide fumes which “Japanese” kerosene heaters are publicity about the scheme. An any user will tell you cause among the most pernicious—and official says on condition of

doing what they do. “The forester yet seems to have come up with a snatches all the charcoal. We also run sustainable, legal charcoal-producing into cops sometimes, but they let us initiative, so Pasang Lama will keep go—after we pay them Rs 10-15 per felling government-owned forest. After Charcoal and gold sack,” says Lama. there isn’t anything left on There are other places also Champadevi, he might have to move around the Valley, like Kakani and to the city, another daily-wage Making charcoal isn’t the most lucrative, green or legal the villages near Pulchowki, where labourer part of the growing urban enterprise, but in many villages on the Valley-rim, people have trees are felled illegally to produce influx, dependent on chance and luck charcoal. There’s even charcoal made for work. Or he and others like him

no choice but to keep at it. from wood salvaged from the might find other forests to turn into ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○

○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ Pashupati cremation site. There are charcoal, and extend their tenuous felling the trees, the charcoal enough for people to make anything and produces a lot of heat. This still other places that local residents subsistence on the Valley-rim for a few producers neatly arrange the chopped but the most meagre living off it. charcoal is produced from very rare would like to mine to produce more years. Either way, the situation branches to the top in the pits and Wotu is the hub for charcoal trees like the agrath. The white and charcoal, but can’t, like Jamacho, looks grim for Pasang Lama and the cover them up with damp green leaves trade in Kathmandu, and technically red varieties burn too quickly without where there is an army barracks, and forests around the Valley. t so that the flames do not burn the it is an illegal trade since practically all producing much heat. The the Shivapuri Watershed Reserve. wood to ashes. After setting the leaves the charcoal there is obtained from temperature in a small 20 cm furnace The forests of Champadevi were Clockwise from below: A chopped tree on alight, they leave. In about 90 hours, trees felled clandestinely. But it has exceeds 20000 Celsius. Goldsmiths undisturbed for some time, until the the south side of the Champadevi the charcoal is ready. To produce a tradition on its side and so no one don’t seem to think it’s the ideal fuel, army barracks moved out of there government-owned forest, packing freshly large sackful of charcoal 10-12 trees does anything to stop it. There is, but as yet it’s the only thing they use. about a year and a half ago. “We’re made charcoal in a sack for sale in Kathmandu, a goldsmith burning brown are required. however, a cloak-and-dagger-ish feel “It’s expensive, but so far we haven’t very poor. There’s nothing else we can

SALIL SUBEDI charcoal in his furnace. ○○○○○○○○○

○○○○○○○ The villages on Champadevi hill, to the way supplies are brought in. tried any alternatives,” says one from do except maybe go to Kathmandu s night embraces the small also known as Bhasmasur Danda, and The salesmen themselves have not had Patan. “We could use LPG or and work as wage labourers,” says avillage of Simpani on the similar places on the Valley-rim have any trouble with the authorities, but electricity. But the gas machine is very Lama. “The forest might last only Champadevi hill south-west been supplying charcoal to the their bosses aren’t taking any chances. noisy and also dangerous to handle. As another five years. Don’t know what of Kathmandu, 35-year-old Pasang Kathmandu area for decades. But, A shopkeeper in the area describes for electricity, there’s no guarantee it I’ll do next.” Lama (first name changed) quietly with the growth of alternative how the operations are carried out: will be available all the time. So we’re Neither the villagers nor walks into the forest on the hill where technologies and the introduction of “There’s a goldsmith in the compelled to use charcoal.” environmentally concerned people are he’s buried his treasure—charcoal. community forestry, it’s getting harder neighbourhood, for example, who has Charcoal retails here at Rs 60/kg, happy with the situation. But no one “It’s about time to take the burning for people from Valley-rim villages to contracted people at Rs 150 a day to or Rs 850 for a 15-kg sack. Lama says coals out from the pit or they’ll be supplement their income from sell charcoal. And his suppliers from the charcoal business doesn’t burnt to ash,” he says. “Couldn’t farming small strips of land with the the villages come early in the morning supplement his income as much as make it during the day.” That was production and sale of charcoal. And when it’s still dark. You see them he’d like it to. “We earn around Rs because a banpale, or forest guard, now they are being driven to cutting sometimes, in rags, carrying bamboo 2500 a month if we can sell regularly had been making his rounds on the down trees under government torches. He pays them and disappears. in Kathmandu,” he says. Lama can

lookout for people like Lama who jurisdiction. It’s all done very quickly.” raise his price October through ALL PHOTOS: SALIL SUBEDI illegally chop down trees in Take a walk through the streets Charcoal is mainly in demand in January, when the demand for gold government-owned forests in the area of Wotu in Kathmandu or Mangal the city not for barbecues or roasting jewellery is fuelled by Dasain, Tihar, and burn them into saleable charcoal Bazaar, and it’s obvious that there’s ears of corn, but in goldsmiths’ and the wedding season. Suppliers like to make a living. still a demand for charcoal in the workshops. There are three kinds— him then visit the city twice a week on On Champadevi hill, along every city—and there are enough suppliers brown, white and red. Goldsmiths use average. They’re paid around Rs 550 10 m are dug pits 3-4 feet deep. After to ensure the price is never high the brown one as it burns very slowly per sack. They know they take a risk 8 NEPALI ECONOMY 5 - 11 JANUARY 2001 NEPALI TIMES

BIZ NEWS ECONOMIC SENSE by ARTHA BEED

Economic mark sheet

○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ At a time when everything else seems to be going wrong, consumer prices continue Closed economy to remain low. The Nepal Rastra Bank, in its economic report for the fourth month of the fiscal year, says government spending is up, mainly due to increased disbursements for budgeted projects. However, even though resource mobilisation There is no right to strike against the public by anybody, improved compared to the corresponding year-earlier period, it was not enough to anywhere, any time. match expenses and forced the government to borrow Rs 1 billion over statutory limits. The deficit of Rs 3.61 billion was plugged with foreign cash loans (Rs 1.42 he events that unfolded in the community makes pleas at all levels. either participating in them directly or billion) and an overdraft of Rs 2.19 billion. t past week prove one point— The irony is that the level of indirectly? Or can it not provide The National Urban Consumer Price Index grew by 2 percent compared to 2.7 strikes have been the only major understanding of the so-called adequate protection to its citizens to percent last year. Prices were kept in check by a drop of 3.4 percentage points in the achievement of restored democracy. leaders of this country is pathetic lead a normal life? Have strikes been index for food and beverages which was enough to offset the 2.5 percentage point Political ambitions and motives today and their vested interests always rise successful because we dislike increase in prices of goods in the non-food and services categories. The price of hold this nation to ransom. The fact above national interest. productivity and cherish the imported goods, including petroleum products, rose most dramatically. that we are losing out as a nation has Strikes are a sign of an additional inactive day bestowed upon Exports continued to grow, and those to India increased by 50 percent. The export stopped mattering to anyone. In the underdeveloped country run by us? Don’t we Nepalis, even if we crib of woollen carpets, readymade garments and handicraft has stagnated while past two months, we have ruined our quasi-developed brains. Almost all about shutdowns, cherish the days we pashmina, tanned skins and pulses continue to do well. Pashmina sales totalled tourism industry with strikes and encyclopaedias refer to strikes as a have to do nothing? Rs 4.3 billion during the review period. Imports were slow during the four-month threats of strikes and if we continue to short-term outcome of the Great The issue in the past week of period, leading to a narrowing of the trade deficit by 3.9 percent to Rs 16.45 billion. glorify our right to strike, we will not Depression, but it’s extremely strikes is not the Rs 100 million lost The balance of payments in the first two months was favourable, despite a have any industry left, forget about unlikely they’ll have any historic either by way of empty hotels, current account deficit of Rs 2.6 billion which resulted from a drop in services and tourism. impact in Nepal. Strikes are on the restaurants, rafts and aircraft. It is the transfer incomes. Still, the country has enough foreign currency to pay for imports for A country with a GDP of just wane worldwide. The only region isolation we are nudging ourselves 11 months. In mid-November, foreign exchange holdings in the banking system over $4 billion cannot afford any that continues to strike with into. An economy that revolves were Rs 100 billion, of which 82 percent was retained in convertible currency. disruption to its economic clockwork efficiency is South Asia. around tourism closes on a day that is activities. With half the populace But even in India strikes are regular one of the biggest money spinners all

Tourism slumps living below subsistence levels, it is only in states with low levels of over the world. We talk about WTO,

○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ absurd to have such frequent economic activity. We should learn an open economy and liberalisation, It was a bad year for Nepali tourism. As feared, the numbers are down by about 11 disruptions. The plight of the from the experience of West but do not accept the importance of a percent, due mainly to the hijacking of IC 814 on Christmas Bengal. The state has been plagued day of such high economic activity. Eve and everything else we’ve done all year to keep tourists by strikes, including state- Nepal will have to follow the world. away. sponsored ones, and the economy Sadly, it cannot be the other way If the post-hijacking publicity did the early damage, the has stagnated. A state that once led around. five-month suspension of Indian Airlines flights and Royal India’s economic advancement is The damage has already been Nepal Airlines’ inability to increase seat capacity did the rest. today an eyesore. The same could inflicted and if we do not take Then, from 1 October, Indian tourists were required to be the story for Nepal. immediate damage-control actions, produce valid identification papers while flying into Nepal. We need to question the concept the impact on the economy may be This forced many to cancel immediate travel plans. of strikes. There’s also the issue of the more far reaching than we can But tourism was looking good in November when the legality of strikes. Is it the possibly comprehend. Either through number of third country tourists surpassed last year’s count. fundamental right of a small group to legislation or activism, strikes and the Then came the hotel strikes and it was all over. The Nepal encroach upon the fundamental right threat of strikes should be eliminated. Tourism Board says only 376,503 tourists came to Nepal by of the majority populace? The Labour I personally favour legislation echoing air compared to 421,188 in 1999. The slump in arrivals was Law does not explicitly talk about Calvin Coolidge’s words—“There is 10.6 percent, due mainly to the massive 32 percent drop in strikes in industries. In fact, no legal no right to strike against the public by Indian arrivals. Indian tourist arrivals, which had begun to improve in the third leadership of political parties can be document addresses the basic anybody, anywhere, any time.” t quarter, again nose-dived towards the year-end, pushing figures down in the fourth judged from the fact that they never question of what a strike is? Have quarter. want to stop carrying out their strikes been successful in crippling (Readers can post their views at antics even if the business normal life because the government is [email protected])

Hotel blues ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ Grindlays Gazette The 10 February “deadline” trade unions had given government to resolve the dispute over the 10 percent service charge is nearing and so is the beginning of the new tourism INTEREST RATE UPDATE CURRENCY UPDATE season. But there is no word yet on what’s happening on work to resolve the problem. NEPALI RUPEE CURRENT% PREVIOUS% AG/USD CURRENT * WK/AGO %CHG Bishnu Lamsal, secretary of the Hotel Workers’ Joint Agitation Committee, told us the unions have not met the deputy prime minister since the last-minute compromise Call Money Avg. 5.20 5.30 OIL (Barrel) 26.80 26.18 + 2.37 reached on 10 Decembers and unions decided to postpone their strike. Nor have they 84 Days t/bill 5.06 5.05 GOLD(Ounce) 272.70 273.55 - 0.31 sat down with the other government committee that is working to find a way out. 91 Days t/bill 5.26 5.25 GOLD ( NPR *) 7160 7135 + 0.35 The government had sought more time to allow the committee headed by National Planning Commission vice-chairman Prithivi Raj Ligal to complete its work and 364 Days t/bill 5.53 4.87 EUR 0.9422 0.9252 + 1.84 recommend a way out. There’s no word on how far the committee has gone, even Repo. rate 5.76 5.75 GBP 1.4930 1.4800 + 0.88 though we’ve been told that the industry has begun work in identifying clauses in the Average rate of 91 days T/Bill moved slightly higher JPY 114.35 112.85 + 1.33 labour law that need to be changed. compared to last week average of 5.25. Market liquidity remained slightly excessive as most of the banks CHF 1.6105 1.6445 - 2.07 experienced lesser customer withdrawal due to continuous AUD 0.5592 0.5565 + 0.49

Bhaktapur visit dearer disturbance of last week. Expected range for next week ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ 5.15 to 5.30 %. INR 46.66 46.66 0.00 Tourists visiting Bhaktapur from 1 January on will have to shell out a $10-dollar entry fee— FOREIGN CURRENCY : Interest rates *Currency bid prices at 4.20 p.m. on 1/1 - Source Reuters twice the fee until last week. The municipality USD EUR GBP JPY CHF Oil: OPEC members’ call to lower prices at the cartel’s has fixed a Rs 50 entry fee for visitors from January 17 meeting and the resumption of Iraqi oil sales to LENDING 9.50 6.50 6.00 1.50 5.13 the South Asian region. The city began Europe has helped lower prices, despite an exceptionally charging an entry fee seven years ago and LIBOR (1M) 6.64 4.90 5.86 0.89 3.49 cold winter in the US and continental Europe. Currencies: The Euro ended the year on a strong note, uses the funds to restore its crumbling soaring to five-month peaks against the dollar and 10- BANK RATES (DEPO/LENDING) Mkt Hi/Lo Mkt Avg medieval temples and rest houses and to month highs against the Yen after spending much of 2000 improve municipal services. S/A NPR 6.25/3.0 5.15 on the defensive. The US dollar was pressured by mounting concerns about the U.S economic slowdown and The tourism industry says the city’s F/D 1 YR 7.25/5.5 6.63 decision would affect their business because slumping Wall Street stock prices. packages are sold in advance. Mayor Prem OVERDRAFT 14.0/11.0 12.67 INDIAN RUPEE OUTLOOK : Economist feel that the focus of the market for the next few weeks will be trying to Suwal says the decision, was not made overnight. He also promises to improve TERM LOAN 14.0/12.0 13.17 gauge the extent of a hard landing in the U.S. and get a tourist facilities. The city has raised over Rs 174 million from tourists since it began IMPORT LN 11.0/9.00 11.88 clearer picture of what the Fed will do in the first quarter. charging an entry fee. At the moment the market is focusing on how weak the EXPORT LN 11.5/9.50 10.38 dollar can get as there is gloom over the U.S. economy MISC LOAN 16.0/13.0 14.50 and all major currencies are benefiting from that except for the Yen, which has its own problems.

0.74 0.37 0.40 0.22 0.37 0.04 53.80 0.69 0.36 0.58 0.36 0.21 0.02 46.67 0.64 0.36 0.57 0.28 0.13 0.05 46.71 INTERNATIONAL SUBSCRIPTION RATES FOR NEPALI TIMES 0.25 0.28 0.40 0.30 0.42 0.21 11.82 6 months 1 year 0.41 0.43 0.52 0.22 0.12 0.03 58.10 SAARC countries US$25 US$48 0.72 0.36 0.60 0.23 0.19 0.03 82.82 0.65 0.38 0.63 0.36 0.30 0.09 74.30 Other countries US$40 US$75 All prices are in US dollars, collected from informal sources, and are only indicative. [email protected] NEPALI ECONOMY 5 - 11 JANUARY 2001 NEPALI TIMES99

wooing them. Now it is going to be We’re convinced smuggling helps doubly difficult. Says Prabhakar Rana no one and we’re ready to co- of the Soaltee Group: “Potential operate with both governments to investors ask us, would you yourself stop it.” Trade in tatters invest now, if you had the money? The battle over copper wires, How do you answer a question like ball bearings, zinc oxide, and that?” polythene bags may end soon, now Unless the government acts quickly, last There are 164 Indian joint that Nepal has agreed to enforce a week’s riots will have a long-term impact ventures in Nepal that account for last-digit change in the four-digit on Indo-Nepal trade and investment. nearly half of all exports to India, and Harmonised Commodity employ about 40 percent of the Description and Coding system for industrial labour force. Larger Nepali goods to qualify for zero companies like Nepal Lever even help customs duty. (This is an international to create new jobs and help prop up system that codifies the extent to ancillaries. It has a network of 70 which an industrial product has stockists and distributors to serve changed from an earlier stage. For 15,000 retailers. Dabur Nepal has instance, the harmonised code for gone a step forward: it does not just cotton is 15.01, yarn made from it sell finished products but also involves becomes 15.02 while the fabric woven farmers in raw material production. It out of it becomes 15.08.) is growing herbs in different parts of The issue of HS coding was raised the country: even getting farmers in by India last year while the row over Jumla to cultivate saffron. It also runs the still unresolved issue of Kodak was a modern nursery near Banepa to raging. “The enforcement of a change produce seedlings. in HS code will force companies to Then there’s the issue of add value to their products, thus widespread re-export that creating more jobs in Nepal,” says one supposedly takes place from Nepal. Commerce Ministry official. The Indians are particularly worried That may help convince some about copper wires, which they say New Delhi-based babus in charge of A billboard advertising a Tata car vandalised by arsonists last week. is imported as sheets and exported trade policy. But after last week, we MIN BAJRACHARYA duty free as wire. Nepal does not may have made it more difficult for

BINOD BHATTARAI ○○○○○○○○○○○○

○○○○ Commerce and Industries (FNCCI), we’re forced to ask ourselves if we’re have shelved plans to set up businesses claim all is well, but says it has our officials to discuss the “surge” of ne dominant theme in last said in a radio interview this week. doing the right thing by thinking in Nepal for one reason or the other. taken steps to ensure that is some items that India has begun to week’s riots in Kathmandu When the first Indian companies about further expansion.” Some Nepal’s hope for industrialisation stopped. “There is smuggling but it talk about. However, the most o was that for the first time it came to invest in Nepal after 1996, companies—ball-pen maker lies in its ability to attract foreign is two way,” says one FNCCI difficult part may be pacifying was an organised and targeted attack the main attraction was the relatively Reynolds, bicycle manufacturer Atlas investors but the government has not official. “The charges about companies who have put money into on Indian interests in Nepal. It jolted lower wages and the lack of unrest and Jain Tubes—are understood to been following up on early successes in dumping are totally unfounded. Nepal projects. t Indian business, India-Nepal joint here compared to the Indian states of ventures, and Nepalis of Indian origin. Bihar, West Bengal and Uttar Unless the government acts quickly to Pradesh. Other attractions were assuage this feeling of insecurity, proximity to the market, cheap memories of this unreasoned rage will unskilled labour and duty-free exports drive away investors who are already to India. By now many companies here and frighten those who are have realised that proximity comes considering investing in Nepal. with hidden costs resulting from Even before the riots, pressure Nepal’s landlockedness: the added had been building on Nepal to amend expenses of raw material import, the 1996 trade treaty. There has been freight and back-freight of finished a barrage of articles in the Indian goods. Then there are security media about how Nepal is being used problems and the politicised unions. as a conduit for everything from Even duty-free export is not as vanaspati (hydrogenated vegetable oil) straightforward—as we’ve seen from to cheap Chinese consumer items to the Kodak Nepal experience. flood the Indian market. There are The Nepali attitude about “big other outstanding issues for Indian brother” comes from a perception investors: that we are overwhelmingly · Security threats from Maoists. dependent on the southern neighbour · The government has not for just about everything. But it is refunded millions it owes to large actually inter-dependence. Especially exporters, mainly Indian joint ventures since 1996, and it’s not just Nepal’s for duty on raw and packing material exports to India that have swelled. imports. Trade figures for the last five years · India says smuggling from Nepal show both Nepal and India have is hurting its industries and so is re- gained from business, and Nepal’s TOYATA export of goods repackaged by fly-by- trade deficit with India is actually night Nepal-based companies. narrowing. Since the signing of the · Pesky Indian traders in fringe trade treaty with India in 1996 markets across the border are also Nepal’s exports to India has grown mad because cheaper imports from six-fold from Rs 3.68 billion to 22.6 Nepal and China is hurting sales. billion in 1999-2000. Imports from Not only is our security India have also grown from Rs 24.4 machinery dysfunctional, politicians billion to 49.9 billion. There are are now actively stoking populist anti- plenty of opportunities to increase Indian feelings as we saw last week. Nepali exports to India, but these This means industries are essentially plans will surely be delayed by last left to fend for themselves against week’s events. everything from labour disputes to Asks one frustrated FNCCI Maoist threats. By now almost official: “How do you convince your everyone, labour unions, students and Indian counterparts to do business the Maoists, have taken pot shots at here when we go about attacking industry, Indian joint ventures them even for unsubstantiated included. A protracted labour dispute rumours about what one Indian out of forced Nepal Battery Company (a one billion may have said?” Aside from Union Carbide India venture) to pull riots and Maoists, even official out in November leaving over 80 ineptitude discourages investors. The workers jobless. Most businesses have unnatural delays in duty drawback been regularly making “contributions” refunds have angered business. The to the Maoist cause. Some larger law says the claims should be settled Indian joint ventures like Surya within 60 days, but some companies Tobacco, Nepal Lever and Colgate- like Nepal Lever have been waiting for Palmolive were vandalised last year in three years for the refunds. The suspected Maoist attacks. government owes Lever Rs 163 “Any investor would first think million and Rs 170 million to another about security of the investment and Indian investor, Dabur Nepal, in duty safety of workers,” Rabi Bhakta refunds. Says T.K. Gupta, director, Shrestha, a vice-president at the Dabur Nepal: “We’ve already invested Federation of Nepalese Chambers of Rs 840 million here and sometimes 10 NEPALI MUSIC NEPALI TIMES Forever Ambar 5 - 11 JANUARY 2001 Ambar Gurung aroused nationalism and nostalgia in the Nepali diaspora with his Naulakha tara udae.

Similarly, Rajnarayan Pradhan stayed feelings of the diaspora in India away for many years. are the dominant The nostalgia that the Nepali theme here. The artistic diaspora used as a conditions of lined both sides of the weapon came to be thought of the original road at the as reality in the course of time. recording University’s But this imagined reality were Kirtipur campus to clashed with their dreams difficult— greet him. Ambar for the future, and was it was performed to a accompanied by the pain of hard to packed Education disillusionment. The Indian organise Hall. He also annexation of Sikkim, the forceful an sang Sugauli eviction of Bhutanese Nepalis and the orchestral sandhi (Sugauli they all drew on the historical roots of creation of a surrogate nation for them accompaniment, Treaty) which ABHI SUBEDI the Nepali language in the in refugee-camp towns in Jhapa there blew the minds ○○○○○○○○hen Ambar Gurung predominantly Nepali-speaking hills district, caused another shift in was of Nepali recorded his famous song of Darjeeling. This sense of the saga of the Nepali diaspora. only one history students w nationalism fit snugly into Nepal’s whose sense of Naulakha tara udae (“Nine Ambar Gurung’s Naulakha tara microphone, hundred thousand stars rise”) in own quest for identity in the 60s and udae is thus an expression of and Ambar nationalism until Calcutta in 1961, it earned him and has stayed on all the way in Ambar nostalgia that has assumed a new Gurung then had been defined lyricist Agam Singh Giri some degree Gurung’s own music. This phase dimension today—its relevance confesses there by patriotic songs that of harassment from the Indian began with a fight against the source revived by new discussions about were stronger came over Radio Nepal. authorities for its emotive call to the of nostalgia itself—the Nepali nation. nationalism in Nepal itself. stanzas in the song He worked as the head mother country. In September last Subhas Ghising’s criticism of The loss, pain and other complex that had to be dropped of the music department at the year, Gurung, who is still singing and Nepal for failing to help the Nepali emotions of exile are seen most while recording. The words, Royal Nepal Academy, but the writing, released a collection of his diaspora in India realise their dream is powerfully in the songs of Ambar the major and minor scales, the academy did not give him memorable hits, including this classic, a case in point. When the Gorkhaland Gurung and the lyrics of his single microphone, the context— Nepali ethno-nationalism in recognition as a pragya, on CD. The song, which was nearly movement in Darjeeling was at its collaborators The re-release of his all its signifiers—address the the Darjeeling hills turned violent academician. He presented an out of circulation, has now got a new peak in the mid-1980s, Ghising, songs is not a beginning but the tragedy of not belonging. The in the late seventies and early amazing “choir” composition for lease on life. This Ambar revival is the himself a novelist, evoked Nepali recapitulation of the tumultuous song is intense, and listeners react eighties. By that time Ambar which Ratna Sumsher Thapa and result of a younger generation of nationalism through interesting history of non-resident Nepalis. It is to the sombre words and the Gurung had long left Darjeeling he wrote songs, but unfortunately Nepali music lovers who want to references to Nepali dramatist and full of unabashed homesickness, the music with raw emotion. for Kathmandu and Agam Singh it wasn’t recorded properly and relive the passion and nationalism that poet Bala Krishna Sama. But at the pain of being uprooted, the ecstasy of Nationalism and the question Giri was dead. Hari Bhakta we don’t know where the tapes characterised the birth of modern same time, he also forced Nepali- creation, and the challenges these of identity have historically Katuwal’s lyrical nationalism did are now. He trained young Nepali music in Darjeeling in the early language writers in Darjeeling to leave conditions pose. inspired exultation as well as not have an audience in Assam, musicians and singers. He set to 1960s, and subsequently transformed their homes, or come to Nepal. Indra The title song Naulakha tara caused pain to Nepalis. This and he also came over to Nepal music lyrics written by the history of music in Nepal itself. Bahadur Rai, for instance, had to leave udae marked Ambar Gurung’s nostalgia was defined by the (although he returned later). songwriters he met here like The musical nationalism of Nepalis in his small cottage at Darjeeling’s association with the late Agam overwhelming presence of India in Ambar Gurung and Agam Thapa and Narayan Gopal. He exile went through various phases, but Tungsung Basti after being attacked. Singh Giri. The experience and shaping the feelings behind the Singh Giri represented Nepali- was a guru to Aruna Lama and music. The Indian nation state Indians’ resistance to a pulverised Sharan Pradhan. Gopal Yonjan, did not tolerate these emotions, Indian identity. But when he another disciple, also came over, and Nepali-Indians were unique came to Nepal, Ambar Gurung married and settled down in because they were (and are) the encountered another kind of Kathmandu. Gopal Yonjan was an only nationality in the union nationalism here. It was founded avatar of the diaspora, and he also which felt the gravitational pull of on praise of the king, and there sang songs about nostalgia, identity, a neighbouring nation that didn’t were territories and historical and patriotism, punctuated with have a history and memory of contexts different from those he references to the Nepalis’ glorious past colonisation. Their language and knew intimately in India. Still, his of selfless bravery in the 1814-16 identity were considered suspect songs fit the paradigm of Nepali Anglo-Nepal War. since they evoked Nepali history nationalism at the time, and King For his part Ambar Gurung did to claim their identity. They Mahendra asked him to stay on. not compromise with the historicised their nostalgia. He was now in the land that had nationalism of royal glorification Nostalgia was the only for so long shaped the for two reasons: he was not a weapon they could effectively use. fundamentals of his art. Nepalis sycophant and he did not identify And effective it was in the rejoiced in Ambar Gurung’s with the glib “entertainment subsequent recognition of hill music, but for the singer it was a value” of patriotic songs as they rule and the incorporation of mixed experience. were in Nepal at that time. Young Nepali in the Indian I first met Ambar Gurung in people today see nationhood of a constitution’s list of official 1968 when he was on a visit to different order, and their interest languages. The strategy worked Kathmandu, staying at the Green in Ambar Gurung is itself a kind because the artists evoked a Hotel in New Road. I asked if he of nostalgia for a time they didn’t history in space: a geographical could give us Tribhuvan experience. The question now is: entity which was remote in one University students a does this generation have an sense, but also tantalisingly near performance. He agreed, and the Ambar Gurung to give musical and immediate. concert was amazing. People expression to a new Nepal? t The Ambar Gurung CD contains the following songs apart from Naulakha tara: 1. Dherai bhaisake, (There have been many) was written by Iswor Ballabh, and addresses a woman trying to capture memories of the good old days. 2. Bataasale jhareko (Windfall) was written by Haribhakta Katuwal. Narayan Gopal sang Katuwal’s songs with Ambar Gurung’s music. He blames karma for every thing, accompanied by a weepy violin. 3. Dandapari (Beyond the mountains) by Indra Thapaliya is a purely romantic number. Ambar Gurung provides mandolin and flute. 4. Mero behoshilai (My carelessness) by poet Iswor Ballabh is a modernist shift from romanticism. The tone is one of assertion and confession. 5. Ma Ambar hun (I am Ambar) by Ambar Gurung himself is a remarkable work of introspective lyricism. 6. Birsepani (Forgetting) by Ambar Gurung is another song about relationships. 7. Yo jindagiko ke kura by Iswor Ballabh’s words ruminate on existence with the music and lyrics giving it a charming authenticity. 8. U pani ta kohi by Ambar Gurung evokes a sense of humanism and tolerance calling on Nepalis to accept Nepalis from outside. 9. Mana sundar shows just how powerful a writer Ambar Gurung also is. The flow of words and poetic rhythm find fitting expression. Naulakha tara (CD with 10 songs sung by Ambar Gurung), Produced by: RBA Films & Research Centre, Kathmandu, 2000, (Original recording: Hindustan Recording Company, 1961), Price: Rs 500 NEPALI MUSIC 5 - 11 JANUARY 2001 NEPALI TIMES11 A rough guide to Nepali World Music

Having nothing but stress and time on our Fusion hands these last tense, Folk Music: instrumental HEART SUTRA: BLISS AND SERENITY—Well-packaged unique blend of shut-down, holiday CHAUTARI—A chautari is a resting place for weeks, Nepali Times travellers. It’s also a popular gathering Nepali folk, traditional and semi-classical music with lively rhythms and decided to relax with place for villagers in the course of their beats. Includes titles called: some Nepali music. It’s daily activities. This album attempts to The Feel of Rain, One not definitive, for few set the ethos of a chautari to music. Night in Ghorepani, lists are. It’s better than Includes Banchari (Songs of the birds), Peaceful Journey, The just representative, we Maruni (a melody from eastern Road to Peace, In hope. It’s a “best of”, Nepal), Tamang Selo (a festive Tamang Harmonic Bliss, Serenity but to say that is to ignore many other equally good recordings. And, melody), and Jhyaure (another festive melody from and Ensemble in naturally, it is totally subjective. The albums have been sorted under seven western Nepal) Percussion. There’s good use of indigenous instruments like broad categories, again, subjective, but helpful to understand the Nepali Artistes: All music composed and arranged by Pancha Lama. murchungna (mouth harp), though there’s plenty of guitar and tabala. music scene, its history and the directions it is developing in. Pancha Bir Lama (flute), Shanti B. Rayamajhi (percussion) accompanied by Artistes: Santosh Bhakta Shrestha (israj), Nava Raj Gurung (tabala and All albums are available on CD in most of the large music stores around Anita Sherchan (sitar) and Japanese artists Nouka Tei (niko), Hiroki percussion), Sujay Shrestha (acoustic guitar), Shyam Nepali (sarangi) Kathmandu, especially in Thamel, and on New Road and Kantipath. Many Minami (bass) and Riko Sato ‘Gaine’ (guitar). and Raman Maharjan (flute). are also available on cassette tapes, which are, of course, significantly Released: 1999 Released: 2000 cheaper. NT does not encourage or promote the piracy industry, so watch Produced by: Pancha Lama Produced by: Mangal K. Maharjan, Tel: 256411 out for unauthorised copies. Recording: Studio Warp, Price: Rs 600 Recording: Bishwo Shahi, Price: Rs 600 You may hum along with traditional favourites like Resham phiriri and Narou mayalu, or imagine the mythical Kathmandu Valley through the very JOURNEY TO NEPAL: THE TYPICAL MUSIC OF NEPAL—Don’t be put off modern songs of a young Newari musician, Bobin Bajracharya: by the English titles to the tracks in this album. “Typical” here means a I was born in a valley variety of mountain and plains sounds, sarangi, and a violin-like Generation Next traditional instrument. This isn’t a strictly instrumental album and as a Where the mountains are holy ROBIN ‘N’ LOOZA—The group focuses Where gods sing and clouds dance bonus provides lyrics. Includes tracks like My beloved, You and me, Art on contemporary situations and the You may rediscover the famous Aruna Lama song Pohar sal khusi phatda of Bhojpuri, Journey to Dolpo, Kantipur folk, Story of Majhi, My realities faced by young people. The (When my happiness was torn last year) or a tribute to the late Arun heart, My last day, and, of course, Resham Phiriri. album is well arranged and Robin’s Thapa, Sanjhako joonsangai (With the evening moon), by another young Artistes: Shyam S. Nepali (sarangi), Viba S. Nepali (percussion), Raman vocals are distinctive as always. experimental musician, Mukti Shakya. Much of the music available will Maharjan/ Sushil Bishwokarma (flute) and Asta Man Darshandhari Includes Mero Maya, Heart and move you to action, or at least the contemplation thereof—there’s a whole (vocal). Soul, Swatantra Jeevan, Starry genre of what we call dhyana music. At the other end of the spectrum is Released: 2000 Starry Night, Maila Bhai, Free My World, Robin, of Robin ‘n’ Looza, who is an avowed disestablishmentarian. We Produced by: Sachida N. Rauniyar and Adhunik Ko Aaganma and Nepal, hits from their last hope you’ll be inspired to explore the wonderful, wide world of music here, Recording: Alfa Digitech Studio, Price: Rs 600 album and enjoy wherever you meander on your journeys through sounds. The band: Robin (vocals/guitar), Sunit (guitar/sitar), Riju (bass), —Salil Subedi Folk Music: vocal Sharad (rhythm/didgeridoo) and Prazol (drums). All songs written by Robin ‘n’ Looza. THET—A collection of “typical” Nepali folk songs, strong on the melodic aspect Released: 2000 Nepali Aadhunik of Nepali folk singing. Includes famous Produced by: Robin ‘n’ Looza Dohari tunes like Narou mayalu, Salko Recording: Namaste Studio, Engineer: Hem Bista, Price: Rs 350 NAULAKHA TARA UDAYE—A collection of ten selected songs by the popular musician-cum-lyricist-cum-singer Ambar Gurung. The album pat bajaundai, Beli ra chameli, Baglunge jhyaure, Pashimai jhyaure, and the KALANKI KO JAM—Mukti Shakya and his band Mukti and the opens with his famous Naulakha tara. The tracks have been re- Revival fuse traditional Newari music and rock. Traditional mastered digitally, but the album retains the original studio ambience. inevitable Resham phiriri. The Jhyaure songs are improvised and speak of instruments like the madal, flute, sarangi and dhime are used. Includes The hiss in the background adds to the flavour of Ambar’s nostalgic Nahera malai, Basanta udayo, Dalli resham, Sani sani, Kanchi nani blues, melodies. (See facing page for details) Nepalis who leave home to earn a living overseas. Vocals: Praveen Gurung, Lochan Bhattarai, Bima Kumari Dura, Rekha and Sanjhako joonsangai, a tribute to the late Arun Thapa. Shaha, Krishna Gurung and Khadka Bahadur Budha. The band: Mukti Shakya (vocals, guitars), Rabin Shrestha (drums), MAYA NAMARA—Ageing Nepali singer Released: 2000 Binod Shrestha (guitar) and Roshan Kansakar (bass). Special Prem Dhoj Pradhan presents his appearance by the famous Nepali pianist Upendra Man Singh. popular contemporary compositions in Produced by: Dexo Music Centre, Thamel, 423526 Recording: Namaste Studio, Price: Rs 600 Released: 2000 a digitally mastered version. Includes Produced by: Mukti & Revival Maya namara (Don’t forget my love), Recording: Namaste Cultural Studio, Engineer: Hem Bista, HIMALAYAN FOLK SONGS OF NEPAL—A collection of 13 typical Nepali Toree phulyo (Flowering mustard), Tara Price: Rs 350 matra haina timilai (It is not only the folk songs sung in local dialects. Includes Salleri, Sanchi rakhe, Deurali, Kanchi ko rumal, Jiri ko basaima, Bajayo binayo, Nuwakote, Taplejung, stars I can bring), Aai jauna chhahari SAMSARA—Grunge, soft rock and on to “oriental nira (Come closer), Mirmire ushama (Simmering dawn). The songs are and, again, Resham phiriri. Vocals: The singers are nameless here, but they do a fine job of rock”. Vocalist Bobin Bajracharya writes: written by noted lyricists like Kiran Kharel, Ratna L Shrestha, Ratna S “The concept of this album is the Pure Thapa, Mina Shah. representing diverse folk styles. Released: 2000 Dhamma—the truth.” There are Released: 1996 traditional instruments like madal, taa, Produced by: Prem Dhoj Pradhan Produced by: Gaurab Music, Thamel, 420917 Recording: N/a, Price: Rs 600 bansuri and tabala, and also the Swaniga Recording: Omniphonics Digital Choir. Includes Sagan and Nepal Recording Studio, Balaju, Price: Rs (instrumental), The faceless man, 600 Shamvalla, Question, Song of Love, Dhamma, Dhyana Music Samsara, Black. EKLAI BASDA—The best songs by the The band: Bobin Bajracharya (vocal, guitars, bass, tambora), Uday DHYANA AMAN: MEDITATION OF NO MIND— late Aruna Lama, includes Pohar Bajracharya (percussion and bell), Tomoko Tamaki (flute and soprano Music for meditation fusing the bamboo flute, saal khusi, Udi jaun bhane, Phoollai sax), Tetsutaro Tamaki (bass). English and Japanese lyrics. ragas, Buddhist chants, singing bowls and sodhen, Hera na hera kanchha, E Released; 2000 percussion. Flautist Manose Singh stars. kanchha, Himalsari ma, Aankhaharule. Lama Produced by: Bobin Bajracharya and Tetsutaro Tamaki Includes tracks called Devotion, Dhayana is accompanied by noted singers like Narayan Gopal, Mani Recording: Sonic Bloom and Morino Hall 21, Price: Rs 600 Kaman, Deep Shrestha, Rudramani Gurung and Jitendra Bardewa in Aman, Mantra Yana, Chants of Buddha Path, some of the songs. The musicians and lyricists of the songs on this Journey to Mustang. album are extremely well known and have been credited with Artistes: All music composed by Manose Singh. Shesh N. revolutionising the Nepali music scene in the 1970s. Shrestha (vocals), Bishnu Lama (vocals), Shree Shahi (singing bowl), Shanti Released: N/a R. Shakya (wind bell). Special guests: Choying Drolma (Buddhist chanting), World Music Produced by: Music Nepal (P) Ltd. Tel: 242049 Dorjee Lama (Buddhist chanting) and Nabaraj Gurung (percussion). Recording: N/a, Price: Rs 350 Released: 1998 HIMALAYAN FEELINGS—A recording by the Produced by: East Meets West Music Box, Thamel, 256411 late Pravin Gurung exploring pure Himalayan Nepali music, especially of DRISHTI—DEEP SHRESTHA’S MODERN Recording: Sangam Studio, Price: Rs 600 western Nepal where all the musicians SONGS. The first release in 10 years by cult singer Deep Shrestha. Shrestha has created INTRANSIENT NATURE—Early morning music. Fusion Dhayana music, very hail from. Includes Bihani, Ukali Orali, his own amalgam of touching lyrics and representative of such collaborations between Nepali and foreign musicians Sorathi (Gurung tune), Namche modern and older styles of singing. Includes with a semi-classical Nepali troupe and folk musicians. Includes tracks called (Sherpa’s feelings), and Chandra Grahan Hara raat sapani ma, Ma sunnai nasakne, Jhir Intransient Nature, Nature at Peace, Meditative Moment, Time in Motion (Lunar eclipse). ma uninu, Batas sangai udirahu and Raatko and Transition Artistes: All music composed and arranged by andheri ma. Deep Shrestha composes the Artistes: Suresh R. Bajracharya (sarod), Navaraj Gurung (tabala), Raman the late Pravin Gurung. Pravin Gurung (hanzi/santoor and tungna), music to all his songs, and so he has for this Maharjan (flute), Norbu Sherpa (violin), Ram Hari Gurung (harmonium), Khadka Buddha (percussion) Krishna Lama (flute, ghyaling), Ishor album. Lyrics are available with the CD. Jublee Gurung and Ranjana Gurung (tanpura). Special guests: Ben Haddon Gurung (percussion, jimbe and tuna). Various guest artistes. Released: 2000 (didgeridoo) and Willow (backing vocals). Released: 2000 Produced by: Deep Shrestha Released: 2000 Produced by: Dexo Music Centre, Thamel, 423526 Recording: Digital Symphonic Recording Studio, Price: Rs 500 Produced by: Mangal Maharjan, 256411 Recording: NA, Price: Rs 600 Recording: Radio Nepal, Price: Rs 600 ALL CDS COURTESY EAST MEETS WEST MUSIC BOX IN THAMEL. 12 MULTIMEDIA 5 - 11 JANUARY 2001 NEPALI TIMES

computer entrepreneur Joseph de Saram to launch the Clarke Omniputer, a mass-market reincarnation of the artificially intelligent HAL-9000 computer, the real star of the film. (See box) The global adulation of Sir Arthur is a world away from his 2001 undistinguished origins on a farm in Minehead in Somerset, where his mother ran the local post office.

ANTHONY BROWNE ○○○○○○○○○○

○○○○○○ His only memory of his father, who e made his fortune from died when he was 13, was when Kubrick’s apartment. Staring at h predicting the future, and they were riding a donkey cart, the bright full moon, they saw a his fame from getting it and Clarke elder passed young light move into the star- right. He’s written over 60 books, Arthur a cigarette card with a splattered night-sky and stop that have sold more than 50 picture of a dinosaur on it, above them. They checked the million. He’s been nominated for sparking his interest in science. New York Times, which listed an Oscar and the Nobel Prize, An engineer uncle gave him the movements of satellites. and won countless other awards. electrical fittings to play with, There was nothing. “Then, a The world’s best selling science- and when he wasn’t attempting little shamefacedly, we called the fiction writer has now seen his to fire moon-bound rockets from Pentagon, and they admitted last ambition realised. his garden, Clarke spun stories that it had been a satellite. It Sir Arthur C. Clarke has long for his school friends. When the seemed a good omen.” wanted see in the year that made war broke out, he joined the The film—provisionally him a household name: 2001. Last RAF and worked with an entitled Journey Beyond the month he turned 83, two weeks American team on a top-secret Stars—was based on his short before the world finally turned radar project. At this time he story, The Sentinel. The director 2001. Confined to a wheelchair by made the prediction that and the author co-wrote the within a year, as well as the post-polio syndrome, travelling is established him as a visionary. screenplay, while Clarke method of landing—having a difficult and 2001 won’t be a space Before there was anything global simultaneously turned it into a mother ship circle the moon, odyssey for Sir Arthur, more an about communications, he wrote novel. The two remained sending a smaller pod down to odyssey of the ego. For a man who In an 83-year odyssey, Arthur C. Clarke has a paper suggesting that ‘geo- friendly until Kubrick’s death the surface. He predicted vast impresses on his visitors his predicted satellite communications and the stationary’ satellites (in orbit last year, but it was a fractions space stations circling the earth boundless but remarkably landing on the moon, and written 60 books. above fixed points on the Earth’s working relationship, with decades before the International inoffensive love of adulation, next surface) could be used to bounce Kubrick particularly frustrated. Space Station that is currently

year will be heavenly. Celebrations Now he’ll see the big party in 2001. radio signals instantaneously When asked about Clarke, being assembled in orbit. ○○○○○○○○○○○○ of the film and book 2001: A Space ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ around the world. His paper, Kubrick joked: “Isn’t that some His personal life has been as Odyssey, are set to explode across photos of him with the Pope, paying homage to him. In 2001, ‘Extra-Terrestrial Relays’, nut who lives up a tree in India?” unconventional as his the planet. Prince Charles and Neil the whole world will be his “ego published by the magazine Clarke retorted with a limerick: professional one, but more In his house in the centre of Armstrong, books dedicated to chamber”. Public excitement Wireless World earned him just “For MGM did Kubrick Stan/A mysterious. His only public Colombo, he describes his him not from VIPs but, he insists, started in November when it was £15 but launched an industry stately astrodome decree/While relationship was a failed marriage favourite room as his “ego VVIPs including Buzz Aldrin and revealed that Sir Arthur is worth hundreds of billions. After Art, the science writer, ran/ in the 1950s that lasted less than chamber”, covered wall-to-wall in Buckminster Fuller, and videos collaborating with the British the war he attained a first in Through plots incredible to a year and was finally dissolved in man/In search of solvency.” 1964. He is widely thought to be The 1968 film provoked a gay, although he has never mixed reaction, but became an publicly acknowledged it. When Son of HAL lives instant sci-fi classic. Its directly asked the question, he depiction of the HAL computer jests he is “merely mildly

ANTHONY BROWNE (each letter one place before cheerful”. The answer pre- ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ ○○○○ IBM in the alphabet) sinisterly sumably lies in his journals, IT COULD think for itself, lip-read, scheme and murder. Now HAL-9000, the infamous computer in trying to kill off the crew of the which are to be sealed until 30 2001: A Space Odyssey which turned on its operators and tried to kill them, is being brought back spaceship, Discovery, and then years after his death because they to life by its creator. Maths and Physics from King’s pleading for its life has haunted might contain “all sorts of Sir Arthur C. Clarke, the author of 2001, is backing a colourful British computer entrepreneur in College in London, and in 1956 more than one generation. embarrassing things”. Clarke says his bid to launch a mass-market version of HAL under the brand name the Clarke Omniputer. It will moved to Sri Lanka, enticed by Clarke followed 2001 with a he was severely hurt by allegations be the first time that Clarke, now 82, has given his name to an electronic device on the market. the scuba-diving and warm 2010:Odyssey Two, which was in the Sunday Mirror two years ago The Clarke 1 Gigahertz Omniputer is being dubbed as the most advanced personal computer climate. He spent many years released as a film in 1982, and that he paid young boys for sex, in the world, verging on artificial intelligence. “For the first time, it gives high-quality architecture at relatively unknown, but writing. then 2061: Odyssey Three. Then which he vehemently denied. low cost, opening the door to handling “I never thought I would be a few years ago came 3001:A However, the controversy, which speech recognition and lip-reading. It successful. Writing was always an Final Odyssey. In that book he flared up just before a visit by will start off addressing issues of enjoyable hobby,” he said predicts the ‘soul-catcher’ Prince Charles to Sri Lanka, led to consciousness,” said Joseph de recently. micro-chip that can a postponement of his knighthood, Saram, the 28-year-old chief executive of Then, a short story and a accommodate the essence of which he finally received early Clarke Omniputers, the Luxembourg- collaboration happened. He met humanity, immortalising human last year. based company behind the project. Stanley Kubrick in Trader Vic’s life and downloading it from He lives in his technopolis “We’re on the verge of going off into bar in New York to talk about a computers at will. Such compound in Colombo with artificial intelligence. HAL is back.” project. Stanley told Clarke that predictions—he calls them business partner Hector The Omniputer has 15 patents on he wanted to do “the proverbial extrapolations—would be easy Ekanayake, his family, and a one- the motherboard alone. It is operated by good science fiction movie”. to scoff at if Clarke hadn’t been eyed Chihuahua called Pepsi. a touch screen display, and so won’t They decided to make 2001 after right so many times before. He With a coterie of staff, he jokes need a mouse. Clarke Omniputers say they already have 60,000 orders for the computer, spotting a UFO from the roof of predicted the moon landings to that he is living the life of the manufactured in China, and hope to sell 350,000 in the first year alone. The price of the computer “imperialist running dog”. He’s will be under £2,000. had an operation for prostate In the film 2001, HAL was the onboard computer for the spaceship Discovery on a trip to cancer, his frame is collapsing, Jupiter. It could hear and see almost everywhere on the ship and, in a famous scene, lip-read a and he has to rest every conversation between crew members hiding in an escape pod. HAL managed to lure his operator, afternoon. There’s one prediction Dave Bowman, into space and tried to lock him out. Bowman was eventually able to break back he must wish will come true into the spaceship where he removed HAL’s chips one by one. HAL begged for its life before being quicker than others: immortality. disarmed and turned off. Like HAL, the Omniputer will, its backers claim, have an instinct to protect But even if it doesn’t, he’s still itself. “If user errors start, and files get deleted, it will start to repair itself, just as cells repair fulfilled his ambition of seeing in themselves,” said De Saram. However, it is thought unlikely that it will try to kill its owner. 2001.t (The Observer) The Omniputer was originally going to be called HAL, but there was an objection from the estate of Stanley Kubrick, the director who co-wrote the screenplay of 2001 with Clarke. That obstacle was overcome, but the backers decided that the name sounded too like the word ‘Hell’ and that it wouldn’t have much resonance with younger customers. eCommerce + Convergence from The launch of the Omniputer was planned for 1 January 2001, but suffered a setback last week when a British court ordered that De Saram’s other company, Rhodium, which he set up in 1995, should be wound up because of £1 million debts. De Saram, now living in Sri Lanka, was last year on the Sunday Times under-30 Rich List, living a millionaire’s lifestyle with several homes and a Ferrari. He insists that he can easily pay the Infinite Possibilities debts but that he relocated to Sri Lanka because his life in the UK was made intolerable by MI5 and the National Criminal Intelligence Service. He claims he was being harassed because an advanced new encryption programme he devised would make it difficult for the security services to

snoop on emails. If you’re not studying at you’re missing something The launch of the Omniputer would be put on hold until the legal issues have been NIIT Kathmandu Centre NIIT Patan Centre t resolved. (The Observer) Kantipath, Tel: 222714 Jawalakhel, Tel: 532332 WORLD 5 - 11 JANUARY 2001 NEPALI TIMES 13 Milosevic’s legacy remains

VESNA PERIC ZIMONJIC ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ DOS’s power at all levels in FRY, The new government of Serbia and Yugoslavia must BELGRADE - Serbia and finally ending Milosevic’s undisputed

Yugoslavia face tough times ahead dominance. He was president of now deal with the fallout of the last decade.

○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ as they try to rebuild the country Serbia from 1990 to 1997, when he ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ from the devastation inflicted pushed himself to the post of Germany and France. They were The new interior minister- economic system will be his during the 10-year rule of president of FRY. He lost the federal cut when the North Atlantic Treaty designate, Belgrade human rights priority. Slobodan Milosevic which ended presidential elections to DOS Organisation, NATO, air raids activist and lawyer Gradimir Nalic, The worst situation is the with the Serbian parliamentary candidate Vojislav Kostunica in started in March 1999. Diplomatic wants a thorough reform of the Serbian economy, devastated by Zoran Djindjic, Democratic Oppostion elections on 23 December. September, while his Socialist Party relations with all republics of the repressive police, that used to be one several rounds of international of Serbia leader and the next Serbian “It would be wrong to say that lost the majority in the federal former Yugoslavia that broke down of the pillars of the former regime. He sanctions, imposed by the UN and Prime Minister everything caused in this country parliament. in the early 90s were re-established. said, “First of all, the reform of the Europe due to Milosevic’s role in by Milosevic simply ended on But fighting the legacy of DOS leader and future Serbian police will turn it into a force that wars in neighbouring former get through the winter, and the December 23,” analyst Milan Milosevic’s regime will be an Prime Minister Zoran Djindjic said protects the people and does not go Yugoslav republics. Additional country needs between $1.4 and Milosevic said. “That was the day enormous effort. In FRY, the federal the new “transparent government of against it. Second, the police will be devastation came with 11 weeks of 1.5 billion in humanitarian that marked the new beginning. president and federal government Serbia will fight corruption and prompt into the investigations that NATO air raids in 1999. “I would assistance for the next six months. The doors to painful recovery are deal with foreign policy, abuses first.” The Milosevic- could bring all the members of former not define the economic reforms as Belgrade can cover about half of open now.” international cooperation and controlled administration was regime, who abused power, into the a shock therapy,” Djindjic said. this. Serbia and Montenegro, which defence. Economic development and notorious for its corruption and hands of justice.” “Serbian economy is already in a Branko Dragas, economic make the Federal Republic of functioning in all the other areas of abuse of funds. Milosevic’s aides In the past decade, state of shock and there is no magic advisor to Zoran Djindjic, says Yugoslavia (FRY), conducted life is within the jurisdiction of the became enormously rich by unemployment reached 40 wand that can bring it back to life. Serbia’s losses in GDP in the past parliamentary elections on 23 governments of republics, Serbia and breaching international sanctions percent in Serbia and salaries fell With the help of international 10 years have reached $216 December. As predicted, the Montenegro. Yugoslav President and exerting a virtual monopoly to $40 a month. In the 80s investors and through our own billion. “Serbia waged wars, Democratic Opposition of Serbia Kostunica has practically ended the over the country’s remaining Yugoslavia was the most efforts, we must be engaged in hard suffered from international (DOS) won a landslide victory. In years of isolation of FRY. Since businesses. Over four billion US developed country in the Balkans, work in many years ahead of us.” isolation, marinated in mafia-style the 250-member parliament, DOS October, FRY has been re-admitted dollars were siphoned out of the and average salaries were 10 times Statistics show that the overall economy led by the mighty will have 176 MPs, Milosevic’s to the UN, the IMF and the country by Milosevic and a few higher than today. Severe production in Serbia is only 43 people,” Dragas said. “We are Socialist Party 37, while two Organisation for Security and aides in the past decade. Djindjic economic sanctions and almost a percent of the production in 1989. deeply in red and the only way out ultranationalist parties—Radicals Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) said that one of the first tasks will decade of isolation brought the Foreign debt, unpaid for 10 years is the total reform of the economy. and Serbian Unity will have 23 and after an eight-year gap. Diplomatic be “to bring the guilty to justice. economy to a standstill. Djindjic now, has reached $15 billion. UN That is where Serba is heading to, 14 seats respectively. relations were renewed with the There will be no reprisals, but no says that the reforms of the officials say Yugoslavia urgently painfully and slowly, in the The victory in Serbia cemented United States, Great Britain, amnesty either.” country’s judicial, police and needs some $800 million in aid to future.” t (IPS)

the republic’s agriculture. In

Afghanistan half the population has Agency with a death wish ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ Heavy weather been affected. A chronic lack of rain ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ Nairobi - When it started work New Year’s day, 1951, the has also gripped the Horn of Africa, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees leaving millions in Ethiopia, The world witnessed extreme (UNHCR) had just 300 staff, a $300,000 budget—and a Somalia, Kenya and Tanzania mandate to go out of business in three years. Far from weather and scientists made threatened by famine. downing its shutters, 50 years on, the agency has grown Ironically, heavy rains doused dire predictions for the future in tandem with the number of refugees. South Africa and Mozambique in The UN General Assembly created UNHCR as a short- of the planet last year. November. Mozambique was still

term project to help Europe’s post-war refugees return

○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ ○○○○○○○○ recovering from devastating floods home or start a new life elsewhere. Fifty years later Climate Change thunder and lightning for the first earlier in the year. UNHCR has some 5,000 staff and a $1 billion annual (IPCC) was leaked to time—a by-product of a warming Low-lying South Pacific island budget. The agency now faces numerous challenges in the New York Times. planet. nations like Tuvalu and the protecting some 12 million refugees, including the safety The report, compiled The new rush of melting has Solomon Islands are also on the of refugees and humanitarian staff, dealing with budget by hundreds of the also hit mountain ranges across the front-line for climate-related cuts, and the growing problem of internal displacement. world’s most respected world. The European Alps have lost oblivion. Two small islands Security has moved higher on the UNHCR agenda in climate scientists, over half their glacier mass during belonging to the island nation of 2000, after four of its workers argues that greenhouse the last century. Glaciers in the Kiribati have already sunk beneath were killed in September gas emissions have Andes and the Himalaya are the waves. Papua New Guinea’s alone, three in West Timor already “contributed disappearing at an alarming rate. government announced in late and one in Guinea. “This is substantially to The loss of glaciers in the Himalaya November that 1,000 people will be because we are increasingly observed warming over is particularly worrying, because the forced to evacuate the nation’s working inside conflict areas, the last 50 years”. The report great Indus, Ganges, Mekong, Duke of York islands because of in places where even MARK LYNAS doubled the worst-case scenario Yangtze and Yellow rivers all rise rising sea levels. ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ peacekeepers won’t go,” - Today’s doomsayers are estimate of what might happen if no from the mountain ice fields and The world struggled to make Refugee camp in western Uganda London says Redmond. “So you’ve researchers like the meteorologists action is taken to stop the release of could dry up once the snows melt. sense of such issues at the got unarmed humanitarian workers trying to help the from Britain’s Hadley Centre who greenhouse gases. Carbon dioxide The human toll of extreme Climate Change Conference. displaced, when displacement of civilians is increasingly revealed in November that within concentrations in the atmosphere weather was also cause for Low-lying nations, represented by the objective of conflict.” This is happening at a time when 50 years our forests and soils that are now higher than at any time in mounting concern in 2000. A the Alliance of Small Island States the agency’s funding is falling short of its requested absorb carbon dioxide could start the last 420,000 years. This has Worldwide Fund for Nature report (AOSIS), pushed for action saying budget by as much as 20 percent. The agency has been releasing it, dramatically already warmed the planet by up to quoted insurance industry rising sea levels may drown their forced to seek money from the private sector and even accelerating global warming. 0.8 ºC, making the 20th century the calculations that economic losses countries. Trinidad and Tobago’s borrowed to cope with the shortfall in 2000. After 2050, if carbon dioxide warmest in 1,000 years, with the from floods and storms between the representative Kishan Kumarsingh Although donor nations overwhelmingly responded to emissions continue to increase, the highest temperatures on record 1970s and 1990s jumped to $399 joked that by 2100 his nation the Kosovo emergency in Europe, they are less willing to Amazon rainforests will turn to occurring during the 1990s. billion from $74.5 billion, even wouldn’t be represented at climate provide funding for long-lasting refugee crises, such as desert and savannah and the Evidence from around the world factoring in inflation and change talks—it would no longer Afghanistan, Sudan and Burundi. Yet those crises typify planet’s average temperature will indicate a changing climate. In population growth. exist. The conference fell apart and the world’s refugee problem far more than Kosovo. The soar six degrees higher. The earth August, scientists aboard the Russian There were floods and a heat most blame the failure on the US. vast majority of the world’s refugees are African and would be the warmest it’s been ice-breaker Yamal were astounded to wave in Europe, but the most Absent from negotiations was any Asian. And although the flow of asylum-seekers into since the extinction of dinosaurs. find only open water and sea gulls destructive weather last year was in consideration of equity—the Europe and North America generates domestic The North Polar ice sheet would flying overhead when they reached Asia and Africa. Monsoon floods in quantity of greenhouse gases each controversy and media attention, poor countries like be reduced to a few large floes, the North Pole. The vessel had to India during the summer killed country will be allowed to produce Tanzania, Pakistan and Guinea host vastly larger parts of the Antarctic could sail another eight km before they nearly 3,000 people and left 2.7 in the long term. Equity is a key numbers of refugees. collapse, pushing up sea levels and found any ice. Studies confirm the million homeless. Countries along demand from India, China and the But, according to UNHCR spokesman Ron Redmond, inundating major cities like Arctic ice sheet is melting, its overall the Mekong river—principally rest of the G-77 group, who point the top challenge is safeguarding the very principle of London and Bangkok. thickness reduced by 43 per cent in Vietnam, Cambodia and Laos— out that each American produces as asylum in a climate of diminishing government sympathy In 2000, such dire climate the last four decades. The ice suffered their worst floods in 60 much greenhouse gas emission as 19 toward refugees. Despite the cash crunch, there are change predictions became covering Greenland is melting at a years. In total some 35 million Indians, 107 Bangladeshis and 269 growing calls—from people like Richard Holbrooke, the commonplace, fuelled by drought, rate equivalent to the annual flow of people were affected. Nepalis. American ambassador to the UN—that UNHCR should floods, storms, heat waves and the Nile. At the same time, much of the Developing countries argue it also take on responsibility for internally displaced other violent weather patterns that Canada’s Inuit people spoke rest of Asia was parched by a is unfair for the rich North to persons (IDPs), estimated at more than 20 million. It’s battered the world. The United from personal experience last year relentless drought that affected continue to enjoy the fruits of unclear whether UNHCR can or will take on such a Nations’ Climate Change about the changes in their arctic more than 60 million people across over a century of fossil fuel-driven task, since the UN operates on the principle of non- Conference, held 13-25 November environment. They’ve seen thinning Afghanistan, Tajikistan, Pakistan, economic growth. With economic interference in domestic affairs. Much will depend on in The Hague, Netherlands, ice, the arrival of new bird species India and Iran. In Tajikistan a growth rates the highest in the the tone set by Ogata’s successor, former Dutch heightened the world’s concern . and damage to buildings and roads million people are on the verge of so-called developing world for Prime Minister Ruud Lubbers, who took over on 1 January, In September, a report by the as frozen ground begins to thaw starvation because of the drought many years now, now they want 2001. t (GEMINI) UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on beneath them. They also saw which has destroyed 90 percent of the same. t (GEMINI) 14 ASIA 5 - 11 JANUARY 2001 NEPALI TIMES

Love, not war, in Jakarta Bangladesh bandhs ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ JAKARTA - After months of being away from the public eye, General Wiranto, Indonesia’s former military chief, re-emerged last

TABIBUL ISLAM English weekly, The Dialogue, month to launch an album of love songs to raise money for a cause. ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ DHAKA - The new year is likely to warned in an editorial: “If the He was not contemplating a career change, but raising funds for open with another bout of crippling BNP sheds its moderate image, it Aceh refugees and the victims of earthquake in Bengkulu province. anti-government street protests across will become a peripheral party The album once again pushed Wiranto into the limelight, and many Bangladesh by opposition parties, like Jamaat-e-Islami and the believe he was trying to repair his tainted image after he was booted out ahead of national polls later in the Awami League will rule the of the Wahid Cabinet in February. “Violators of human rights in this year. However, rivals of Prime roost.” country continue to feel respectable. They can show up and sing on TV Minister Sheikh Hasina may find that Sheikh Hasina has announced without any embarrassment,” remarked Todung Mulya Lubis, from the far from forcing the government to that she will begin her party’s poll Centre for Study on Human Rights (Yapusham). “And much of society step down, their strategy may cost campaign in March. Political doesn’t see them as culprits because rights abuse is not a crime (here), them popular support. Political observers say that the prime although it a serious crime against humanity,” he said. observers agree that most people in minister has some impressive Wiranto is not Bangladesh, one of the world’s lowest achievements to show voters. She among the 22 high- income nations, are tired of the four- can claim credit for ending an ranking military and-a-half years of unending street officers under Bangladeshi PM Sheikh Hasina (left) with Bangladesh National Party over two-decade-old, violent protests by the opposition which have investigation for the Chairperson Khaleda Zia. tribal insurgency in the south- caused great economic loss to the eastern Chittagong Hill Tracts, violence following the country. Though still immensely and signing the historic Ganga East Timor ballot in popular, Hasina’s arch-foe and former The BNP may pay a price for street water-sharing treaty with August 1999, which premier Khaleda Zia is hurting her protests and allying with religious neighbouring India. Bangladesh is favoured main opposition party’s credibility by also said to have achieved near independence from General Wiranto and his CD of love songs teaming up with right-wing religious hardliners and ex-dictators. self-sufficiency in food production Indonesia. In the 1998 parties and former dictators. depriving the country of a legislature put Ershad behind bars for five in the past four years, reduced its attack at Trisakti University where seven students were shot dead, Bangladesh is due to elect a new for most of this period. The street years and filed as many as 15 population growth rate to 1.6 not a single police or military officer has been accused. The student- 300-member parliament after the five- protests and public strikes, not only corruption cases against him,” said percent annually, and kept led protests triggered multi-sector demonstrations which forced year tenure of the ruling Awami caused immense business loss to rich a BNP activist, who didn’t want to inflation way below double digits. Suharto to step down after three decades in power. League ends on 13 July next year. and poor alike, but also put off foreign be identified. He added that the Raising Bangladesh’s annual Human rights have not improved during the “reformasi” era, Under the constitution, the prime investors. Many issues on which the people of Bangladesh would “surely Gross Domestic Product (GDP) activists say. The Committee for Victims of Violence and Missing minister will then have to make way protests were launched, had little question the wisdom and rationale” growth rate to five percent and Persons (Kontras) reports that last year there were 1,216 cases of for a caretaker administration which appeal for ordinary people say of the BNP’s alliance with the reducing dependence on foreign rights violations across the country. 2,119 people died as a result, will supervise the polls. analysts. As a result, the government Jatiyo Party of Ershad, who was aid are said to be the other two-thirds while in government custody. The police are the top However, opposition parties was more often able to take the moral ousted by a campaign by all major achievements of the Awami rights violators, added Kontras, followed by the military. The want Hasina to step down straight high ground during such protests. parties, including the BNP and the League government. Hasina’s Indonesian Attorney General initiated the inquiry into the East away. The anti-government alliance Even the leaders of the Awami League. government also won some praise Timor violence primarily due to international pressure, some say. led by Zia’s Bangladesh National opposition alliance now realise this A sizeable section of at home and abroad for its President Wahid had vowed political reforms, including a tough Party (BNP) is busy chalking out a and not all favour such a strategy. professionals and academics, who handling of the disastrous floods campaign against corruption and human rights violations, but this strategy for street protests starting At a strategy conclave in December, are strong critics of the Awami two years ago. has been an uphill battle. In promoting human rights, the biggest early this month. “By intensifying the hardline BNP leaders spoke in League and favour the BNP, are However, voters have enough problem is changing the mindset of people. “Indonesians have a street movement, we will destabilise favour of several spells of three to also unhappy with the BNP’s reason to be unhappy with the long-established view that the king and his circles can do no wrong,” the government of Sheikh Hasina and four successive days of countrywide hob-nobbing with the Jamaat-e- government, which has been said Lubis. “To many, human rights is a concept of the West, who compel it to step down,” said a top street protests. But moderates Islami. The religious party had widely criticised for the in turn press weak countries in order to show their hegemony and BNP leader, who did not want to be opposed the idea saying this would opposed the 1971 “Liberation worsening law and order situation supremacy,” he added. Many Indonesians who embrace the concept identified. add to the sufferings of the people War”. The Jamaat was accused of and failing to tackle corruption of human rights don’t want foreigners investigating the Indonesian The opposition alliance includes and alienate voters. collaborating with the Pakistani among public servants. According military even for rights promotion. A rally against the UN outside former authoritarian ruler HM The BNP has also come under army, which was charged with to the latest estimate by the the House of Representatives in Jakarta last month protested the Ershad’s Jatiyo Party and the religious fire from different quarters, carrying out a genocide in which global anti-corruption watchdog, involvement of the UN in the investigation of 22 suspects in the groups, the Jamaat-e-Islami and including its supporters, for its some three million Bengali people Transparency International, East Timor violence. And human rights isn’t a “bread and butter” Islami Oikkaya Jot. Political analysts electoral alliance with Ershad’s in the then East Pakistan were corruption drained away some issue. “In villages, people still think that the only right they possess here say that the BNP committed a party. The former president, killed. “How can the BNP enter two billion US dollars of is to work hard in order to be able to get food,” said Wardah big political blunder by choosing a toppled by a popular upsurge in the into an alliance with the Jamaat, government funds in the first Hafidz, chairperson of the Urban Poor Consortium. With no tough street agitation programme to late 1980s, is widely accused of which is yet to reconcile itself half of last year. “Corruption acceptable solution in troubled places like Aceh, Maluku and Papua, oust the government from the day it corruption and abuse of power with the independence of has been retarding the progress more cases of rights violations will occur, and Wahid’s pledge to took office in June 1996. during his nine years of Bangladesh?” asked an angry of the nation,” says top improve the country’s human rights record will continue to be The opposition also boycotted authoritarian rule. “It was the academic, who did not want to be Bangladeshi economist Muzaffar unfulfilled. t (IPS) parliament for long stretches, virtually (then)Euphoria BNP government which had named. Theto pro-opposition amnesiaAhmed. t (IPS) in East Timor

KALINGA SENEVIRATNE ○○○○○○○○○○○

○○○○○ ASEAN has limited resources and form a West Pacific Forum (WPF) Quoting an unnamed senior SINGAPORE - The realities of could not help much. which would include Indonesia, East Indonesian foreign ministry official, rebuilding a shattered economy are “It is very pragmatic advice and Timor, Papua New Guinea, Australia, the Straits Times said Wahid’s main prompting East Timor’s leaders to we take it seriously,” said Ramos New Zealand and the Philippines— aim in proposing the West Pacific turn to pragmatism in dealing with Horta, who attended last year’s but not Singapore. Forum was to manage and contain an the territory’s neighbours as the annual ASEAN meetings in Thailand Australia and New Zealand independent East Timor, by keeping countdown to full independence as an observer. East Timor will use have responded positively to the it within the Southeast Asian circle begins. “We are starting from absolute this period before formal idea. The two countries’ foreign and not in Australia’s shadow. “He ground zero,” Jose Ramos Horta, independence to gain acquaintances ministers said last month that they does not want Australia to be the only Cabinet Minister for Foreign Affairs of Jose Ramos Horta and build trust and sympathy in would start drawing up a framework country deciding development there,” the East Timor Transitional Jose Ramos Horta, Nobel Laureate and key neighbouring countries. East Timor for the new body. Ramos Horta the official said. “His preference was Authority, told a seminar at the will open its first diplomatic mission said that East Timor would be for ASEAN to rope in East Timor, so Institute of South East Asian Studies East Timorese political figure, sees caution in Jakarta soon. Ramos Horta was in interested in joining such a forum that Indonesia, as one of the member here last month. “For the next two or and reconciliation in the country’s future. a conciliatory mood when asked “as long as that does not mean states, could watch over it. Having

three years, we will have to rely on ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ about Indonesia’s hesitation to bring exclusion from ASEAN,” which he failed to secure this, he had to come generous international assistance,” umbrella, far more reliable and Cambodia, Laos, and Malaysia. to justice those accused of war crimes called “irreplaceable”. up with this West Pacific Forum added the Nobel Peace Prize awardee. credible than having an army.” The change in his remarks in East Timor before and immediately While Australia in particular idea,” the same official added. Ramos Horta indicated that he This is a far cry from comments indicates a realisation that East Timor after the independence vote. “We will seems very keen on Wahid’s West Jakarta is worried about attaches special importance to he made in a similar address in Sydney will need both political and economic wait. We don’t want to make life Pacific Forum—probably seeing a Australia pumping so much money repairing the relationship with East last year, where he argued that East support from its neighbours. Ramos difficult for them, but if they fail to chance for Canberra to finally link into East Timor. In addition to Timor’s former ruler, Indonesia. He Timor was part of the South Pacific Horta took up the issue of East deliver, then there can be no other up formally with Asia—the proposal economic projects, Canberra has added that an independent East group of nations and not part of Timor joining ASEAN with option (to a UN tribunal trying has been criticised in Indonesia and also offered US$8.5 million to Timor would like to become a full ASEAN. At that time he indicated a Singapore’s Prime Minister Goh them),” said Ramos Horta. Singapore. The Indonesian daily develop East Timor’s defence member of the Association of South preference for East Timor to join the Chok Tong and Senior Minister Lee After the ASEAN informal Kompas reported that a seminar in capability. “Australia figures East Asian Nations (ASEAN). East South Pacific Forum, whose members Kuan Yew during his visit here. The summit here last month, Indonesia’s Jakarta of academics, government prominently in Mr Abdurrahman’s Timor will probably make a formal include Papua New Guinea, Australia, two leaders advised him to delay President Abdurrahman Wahid officials and legislators rejected the foreign policy calculus,” observed application for ASEAN membership New Zealand and 13 small island joining, because if East Timor joins accused Singapore of acting in a selfish West Pacific Forum proposal as a Straits Times analyst Derwin Pereira. after full independence in December nations of the South Pacific. In ASEAN too quickly, the EU and the manner in rejecting his proposal to “wrong time to propose a new “The pact (WPF) would allow him 2001. “Joining ASEAN is of strategic contrast, ASEAN’s 10 members are UN would say that ASEAN should admit East Timor and Papua New forum.” They criticised Wahid for not just to watch over East Timor, importance,” he said, adding, “it Singapore, Thailand, Indonesia, support East Timor and withhold Guinea—an observer—into the proposing it without prior but also to keep tabs on Australian would also provide a security Philippines, Brunei, Vietnam, Burma, some aid. They pointed out that regional grouping. He threatened to consultation with Parliament. initiatives in the area.” t (IPS) FROM THE NEPALI PRESS 5 - 11 JANUARY 2001 NEPALI TIMES 15

More on Rhithik... giving it now too. It is that India is a revisionist and reactionary ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ democracy, and people can say what government forces added oil to fire. We fully support those brave students they want to. This reasoning has no The government responded with a Bam Dev refuses to who are protesting, and appeal to all logic to it now. A larger democracy police force that targeted innocent patriotic Nepalis, republican and than India, the US, does not give any lives in the name of controlling the leftists to help us unseat this visas to people opposed to it. In the mob. This plunged the country into a accept Hrithik denial government of Koirala. same way, Nepalis should be alert and serious mess. —Communist Party of Nepal give a befitting reply to all who have The Nepali Congress government, (Maoist) statement reported in Jana evil intentions about Nepal. which had never been sensitive about During last week’s protests against rumoured comments by Indian film actor Hrithik Roshan, BBC Nepali Awhan, 29 December —CPN(UML) spokesman, Pradip the Nepali people’s sentiments, Service’s Rabindra Mishra interviewed Bam Dev Gautam, General Secretary, Communist Party of Nepal Nepal in Naya Sadak, suddenly reacted and banned the (Marxist-Leninist), and Ishwor Pokhrel, member of the Central Committee, Communist Party of Nepal 28 December screening of Hritik’s films through a (Unified Marxist-Leninist). Excerpts follow: directive from the communications The ministry of communication had ministry. Bam Dev Gautam: I think the reaction in Nepal and issued a directive that none of The ban triggered more riots and Kathmandu is natural and correct. Whatever is happening now Hrithik’s movies should be shown in violence in the country. But all this is the feelings against Hrithik Roshan’s wrong, damaging and Nepal until and unless he apologises turned out to be a farce when the insulting comments which has now taken the shape of a publicly. It seems some of the officials actor denied making any remarks nationalist wave. The government tried to impede the in that ministry themselves do not against Nepal and the Nepalis. The expression of the nationalistic feelings of the people by firing at know about this directive. At 6 in the Indian embassy also made a similar the protestors, and that has left four innocent people dead. evening, when the streets of statement representing the Indian BBC: You say these reaction was natural and appropriate but Kathmandu were on fire, the home government. do you have any proof that he had actually made the comments? Nepalis may not have anything or ministry released this directive on To be led by rumours is typical MIN BAJRACHARYA BDG: No, I don’t need to give proof about whether he said it or know anything but they are very behalf of the communication ministry. mob psychology. But for a not. The Nepali people have already done that. If I were to say anything I would say he should not have made patriotic and are nationalists to the The communication ministry insisted, government body itself to be so led is such things. core. They are not prepared to hear Hrithik, who had earlier stated that not typical. The knee-jerk reaction Indian artistes say that they do not he does not like Nepalis, should now from both the government and the so- BBC: It’s different to say he should not have said it but when students close to your party and others are like Nepal and Nepalis time and publicly apologise and declare that he called patriotic political parties has protesting, all we are asking is whether you have any proof at all? again. If any Indian artiste says this, likes Nepalis. placed Nepal in a very embarrassing BDG: How can you take Hrithik Roshan’s side when you are staying in London? His remarks were heard on Nepalis respond with statements and —Budhabar, 27 December situation in the international arena. television channels, it was in the papers. Just because Hrithik Roshan has denied ever making such comments burn posters and effigies of that Indian Had the young star made such today and so on, can we say that is true? Can you give proof of that? Therefore whatever you have heard is artiste. This seems to be the only way In an interview to the Star Plus remarks and his fans here rejected his wrong. The insulting things done against Nepal and Nepalis by some Indian artistes are very saddening, in which Nepalis can express their channel a couple of days back, Indian films and started hating him that shameful and worth protesting. Does it suit you, a Nepali living in London, to ask for proof of whether he said patriotism and nationalism. artist Hrithik Roshan stated that would have been a different matter. it or not? Let’s not talk about that. He definitely said it. For proof you have the TV channel. —Kishor Nepal in Naya Sadak, 27 Nepal is a wretched country and that But it cannot be an uprising against BBC: When we contacted the television channel it was not confirmed, and Hrithik Roshan has issued a December people living in Nepal don’t have any another country because Hritik’s does statement denying he ever said that and has said he loves Nepal and Nepalis. brains. It is in response to this and not represent the Indian government BDG: That is what he is saying now. How can you reach any conclusion on what he has said now? Hrithik is the grandson of Roshan, a against the flow of Hindi movies into nor its people nor is he an official of great musician. His uncle, too, is a Nepal that we have burnt his posters the Indian bureaucracy or the BBC: I am not making a judgment. I don’t even have that authority I’m only trying to question you by staying good musician. Knowledge cannot be and effigies, said Ghan Shyam government. Whether someone likes in the middle passed down through generations. In Bhattarai, general secretary of the or dislikes any person, place or object BDG: You should first find the facts and say that he has not said it at all. He said it but now denies doing that. an interview Hrithik had bad- students’ union of Sapta Gandaki is of his or her personal interest, just The channel that broadcast it may have tried to erase it but there must be some proof of what has already mouthed Nepal. In response, the College, Chitwan. as there are many Nepalis who don’t become public. It was on the basis of that proof that the sentiments of the Nepalis were hurt. Nepalis burnt his posters, his effigies —Jana Aastha, 27 December like the Indian government and its BBC: If he had said it many people may consider the reaction as natural but is it right to stage protests which and have decided to boycott his interventions.

has caused so much damage and even loss of human life without having solid evidence? Don’t you need solid movies. This is also a warning to all ...Also Manisha The ban on Hritik’s films by the ○○○○○○○○○○○ proof to base your protests on? who have bad intentions against ○○○○○ Nepali government has now affected BDG: He has definitely said it. He has definitely insulted Nepalis and Nepal. The Nepali people poured their Nepal and the Nepali. For this the Poet Bhupi Sherchan’s description of the famous Nepali Bollywood actress sentiments against that insult and that should have been allowed. But the government—which is used to country had to pay a great price. This Nepal as a ‘country of rumours’ has Manisha Koirala. Indian students have wagging its tail in front of Indian rulers—this time too crushed the protests, shot them... is because the present government is come very true in what took place begun demanding a ban on Koirala’s inefficient. recently. It all started with a report movies. The National Student’s (BBC tries to interrupt) It is because of this attitude of the published by Chitwan Post—a Union of India in Madhya Pradesh BDG: What do you want? Only things you want (to hear). Take what the Nepali state now needs. Today the Indians, that Nepali sentiments and Narayanghat-based daily, about a recently rioted in Indore to cancel the Nepal government, the Nepali Congress government has shot and killed four innocent, unarmed people for nationalism are forced to survive by protest rally in Narayanghat premier of Champion, Koirala’s new what? For saying that the Indian actor should not have made those insulting comments against Nepal. protesting against India. This is not a denouncing the statement made by release, and the local magistrate mirage. We are between two big the famous Indian actor Hritik complied. BBC: Many may agree with that aspect but on something which you passionately feel about, when so many nations, both have large areas and big Roshan against the Nepal and Nepali —Dristi, 2 January journalists have not found solid proof, how did you find it? populations, but we have never been in a ‘satellite television channel’. A BDG: We found it in the Star Channel and on that basis newspapers published the reports troubled or humiliated by our week after the report was published, *** northern neighbour. It is always our all the national dailies were suddenly Ishwor Pokhrel: The public have reacted to what Indian cine artist BAJRACHARYA MIN southern neighbor which troubles and flooded with similar reports. Hrithik Roshan’s said. I am not aware of any political party giving much humiliates us. That is why all Nepalis As events snowballed out of importance to the issue to make it the main reason for protest. What our grow up with an anti-Indian feeling. control, none of the dailies nor the party feels is that the remarks, which we’ve been told of, are not By boycotting Hrithik, the youth rioting student’s unions made any appropriate and can affect the relationship between our two countries. But have done a good job. The danger is effort to verify and confirm the so- the government’s action to crush the protests, where shots fired even that this boycott may fizzle out. The called statement made by Roshan. As killed people in their homes is a very irresponsible and condemnable act. Indian side has always been able to a result, the country was consumed by What we are saying is that the Home Minister should resign immediately give one explanation and they are flames. If that was not enough, the to take responsibility for these acts. BBC: We’ll talk about resignation later. You say Hrithik Roshan’s QUOTE OF THE WEEK statements were irresponsible, do you have any basis to say that he When a bullet is fired, the bullet cannot differentiate between a minister and a child. A bullet is a bullet and the actually said it? policeman who fires it remains a policeman...A bullet does not have eyes. IP: From what we have learnt...you might ask whether I heard it myself or whether I watched the interview —Nepali Congress Central Committee member and former water resources minister, but we’ve heard about the people that heard it, official institutions. Even the government has officially Laxman Prasad Ghimire, speaking to Jana Astha, 3 January, defending the police firings of 26 December. denounced his statement saying that until he apologises for the irresponsible statements his films will not be screened in Nepali cinemas. That also proves that his statements are true, it does not matter if I heard or watched it or not. BBC: Hrithik Roshan has issued a statement saying he’s never said that and he loves Nepal and Nepalis. And that his competitors may be doing that to damage his image IP: If he has said that then we need to take it into account, it could be true. But I have not read his statement or heard about it, but I have heard about his denial in the media. BBC: Do you think it was right to stage nationwide protests without confirming if the statements were made or not? IP: I should contradict you here and say that there were no nationwide protests to counter what he said. Some students had expressed their resentment against the statements, protested it through statements, some people, unorganised as they were, went to cinema halls to ask them to stop screening his movies, that is what we have come to know. We are also surprised by the way the situation has been provoked, the type of people involved in the protests, the way they are attacking other people, the way the protests have taken a communal angle, launch an attack against the democratic system itself, this is really suspect and we are observing it seriously. BBC: What will your future reactions be? Are you in favour of the Home Minister resigning? IP: At the moment we are not thinking of the long term. Our focus now is that killings has taken place, the home minister should take moral responsibility for it and resign, one thing, secondly action should be taken against those that were responsible and the injured should be treated and families of the dead have to be provided compensation. And a powerful, high-level commission needs to be formed to investigate the whole issue. Himal Khabarpatrika, 31 December, 2000 to 13 January, 2001

THIS PAGE CONTAINS MATERIAL SELECTED FROM THE NEPALI LANGUAGE PRESS 16 CITY 5 - 11 JANUARY 2001 NEPALI TIMES

ABOUT TOWN MOVIES Movie ticket bookings online at EXHIBITION v Angkor. A black and white photography exhibition by Jaro Poncar from Prague. The focus of the exhibition is the temple complex Angkor Wat regarded as one of the architectural wonders of the world. December 20—January 20. 8 am to 6 pm. Indigo Gallery, Naxal. MUSIC v Jazz Jazz by Cadenza at Upstairs Restaurant, Lazimpat. Every Saturday 7:30pm—10pm.

v Rock and Blues Robin ‘n’ Looza play rock, blues, soul, and Nepali tunes at The Bamboo Club, Thamel. Every Friday evening.

v Live Shows Various bands at The Red Onion Bar, Lazimpat. Every evening. 416071

v Chakra The Piano Lounge at the Yak & Yeti Hotel. Every evening 7 pm onwards. 248999

v Unplugged Syabru Lama plays guitar at the Coffee Shop, Hotel De l’ Annapurna. Everyday 7:30pm – 10pm. 221711

v Classical Guitar Kishor Gurung plays classical favourites at the Chimney, Hotel Yak & Yeti. Everyday 8pm onwards. 248999

v Classical Musicians from Nepal and abroad at the Kirateswore Mahadev temple, Pashupatinath. January 9 from 4pm—8pm. Free entrance, but charges may apply for special guest appearances. Organised by Kirateswore Sangeet Ashram. 492139 DANCE v Classical Nepali Dances based on Buddhist and Hindu epics and the Tantric pantheon at the Great Pagoda, Hotel Vajra. Every Tuesday, 7pm onwards. Rs 300. 271545

v Ballads and Dances of Old Tibet performed by Tsering Gurmey and Tsering Paljor at the Naga Theatre, Hotel Vajra. Every Thursday, 7pm onwards. Rs 400. 271545 THEATRE v Dr. Knock, or the Triumph of Medical Science. A Nepali adaptation by Kalpana Ghimire of the French play by Jules Romain under the Nepali title: Dr. Kanak. Performed by The Royal Nepal Academy and Arohan Sanibar. Reserved invitation. Children under 10 not allowed. Royal Nepal Academy Hall, Kamaladi. Monday, January 8. 4.30 pm. EVENTS v Ekata Diwas Birthday celebration of King Prithivi Narayan Shah. Government officials and citizens gather early morning in front of the statue of the king outside Singha Durbar. Also a national holiday. Thursday, 11 January. FESTIVAL v Swasthani Fasting The annual festival of Nepali Hindus, Swasthani Barta, begins Tuesday, January 9 and extends till Thursday, February 8. This month people gather and read the story of Swasthani in their homes. While listening to the story, devotees make offerings of flowers and food to the holy book. It is believed that even hearing the story releases one from bad omen. MARTIN CHAUTARI v Classic Nepali Discussion Series 2: Indra Bahadur Rai’s ‘Aaja Ramita Chha’ Sangeeta Pandey and Asutosh Toward will lead the discussion forum. Tuesday, January 9. 5:30 pm. Unless otherwise noted, presentations are in Nepali. Write or call for directions: [email protected], 246065

For inclusion in the listing send information to [email protected]

NEPALI WEATHER by NGAMINDRA DAHAL QUICKWORD 14 by CROSS EYES

Across Down Terms and conditions 1 Eyeballs (4) 1 The contest is open to everyone, except 1 Pass to take a bath (4) employees of Himalmedia Pvt Ltd and 5 Hold the horse command (4) 2 Agree to compact (4) Infocom Pvt Ltd. 9 Headless beach (4) 3 Sir Andrew Aguecheek’s 2 In case of more than one correct entry, 10 Lo-cal eggs: boil, poach, pain (4) the winner will be decided by lucky draw. or_? (5) 4 Holds up the beaches (6) 3 Entries have to reach Himalmedia, by 5 5 Child’s eternal question (3) pm, Tuesday.

DSES- 03-01-2001 0900 GMT 11 Resoundingly successful car 12 Member of Antisthene’s 6 Fundo to the south (5) 4 The winner will be announced in the sect (5) 7 Betelgeuse’s family (5) coming issue. 13 Sophisticated boombox (6) 8 The shape triumphed, in the 5 The prize has to be collected from past (5) Himalmedia within a week of the 15 Sloe-eyed or _-eyed? (3) announcement. Please come with an ID. 16 Former dog-slaughterhouse 10 Checks out scientific (2,5) instruments (6) 18 False move (7) 14 Not quite extinct (6) QUICKWORD ANSWER 13 21 Mormon’s drop their h’s 17 Religion to the masses (6) The huge masses of ground fog over North India (seen above) are 22 Peripheral remarks (6) 18 Wall art (5) caused by the moisture brought in by this weekend’s rain. In Nepal, the 26 Poe’s bird (5) 19 Vespucci sailed from? (5) first precipitation of the season brought snow down to 13,000 ft. All 28 Bubbly sweet (4) 20 For screens, and in discount caused by a cyclone in the Arabian Sea that pulled in water vapour to 29 Notify of vigilance (5) stores (5) 23 Expensive form of Nepal from Central and West Asia. Now, patches of cloud layers are 30 Tampa, mostly (4) 100 31 Greek instrument (4) address (4) looming over the southern foothills of the Himalaya. Conclusion: WIN A 32 Erap’s times (4) 24 Excuse me, mother, more clouds which may bring snow in the Western and Central informally (2,2) HOUR INFOCOM Himalaya. Sunny days in the hills may be interrupted by these cloudy MILLENNIUM 25 Soaking subsidies (4) patches. Kathmandu will have clear days, but expect cold and foggy CD WORTH 27 Bard’s past (3) mornings. The unusually balmy temperatures of the early part of the RS 3600/- week will give way to a drop in the mercury. Out of four correct entries the The most convenient and economic way to surf the internet lucky winner is Alan Etherington KATHMANDU Fri Sat Sun Mon Tue To send in your entries, please fill in the details below and fax to 977-1-521013, or email to [email protected]. Entries can be dropped off at Himalmedia Pvt Ltd, Patan Dhoka, Lalitpur. Name...... 22-02 20-04 21-03 21-02 20-03 Ph...... email...... CULTURE 5 - 11 JANUARY 2001 NEPALI TIMES 17 SAVING FAITH In the heart of eternityby DESMOND DOIG

t the centre of Patan is its foundations. What an incredible lions and elephants on tiered aDurbar Square, a massive pile it is—of brick and carved temple plinths or on platforms living museum of wood pierced with golden doors designed for public durbars and architecture and art that is and exquisite windows. Pagoda public entertainment. I have often endlessly wondrous. For here, roofs, many of them gilded and watched heroic dramas being treasure is heaped on treasure. with golden finials, tower one performed in front of the Taleju Palaces and temples stand above the other to culminate in temple by petromax lamps and harmoniously together as if the the seven-storeyed temple of erratic electric lights. By day, builders of many centuries were Taleju, the royal goddess. huge tourist coaches force the following a plan conceived when Opposite the palace, almost square and camera-laden the city was young—a time filling the square, are temples in foreigners are almost as numerous unhesitatingly described as when stone, brick and wood that are as locals. About the sati temple gods walked the earth. Historians each a masterpiece of its hill people invariably congregate have the city rebuilt by King particular age and style. Two in a riot of uninhibited colour. Veera Den in the year AD 299. It stone shikara type temples, both The women wear bright beads was a flourishing city when the dedicated to Krishna, and coin necklaces. Saucer-sized Emperor Ashoka visited it in commemorate two widely gold earrings. Flower-shaped nose about 250 BC, and an impres- differing events. One, the sati of rings. Gaudy head shawls. Vivid sively large one as measured by eight queens, the wives of King waist bands. Men sport jaunty the stupas that Ashoka had raised Yoganarendra Malla whose golden caps and rough woollen jackets, at its cardinal points. The city statue sits atop a stone pillar in their song and laughter prompted was apparently built in the shape the square, and the other a king’s both by a warming drink and the of a chakra, one of the sacred romantic dream. The latter intoxicating atmosphere of Patan. emblems of Vishnu. The planning temple tells, in exquisite stone The other, more splendid of its streets and its water and carving, the entire stories of the Krishna temple of the royal sewage system were ahead of the Mahabharata and the Ramayana. dream, is as surely thronged with times. For sheer beauty it was It is built on the spot where King devotees from south India, mostly unrivalled. To this day, one has Siddhi Nara Singh Malla dreamt solemn, often garrulous. Children only to stand at the entrance to the he saw Krishna and his consort well versed in the ways of modern Durbar Square to gaze upon Radha making love. Before it, on tourists and speaking a smattering Eternity Itself—a description of the a high lotus pedestal, sits the of several languages pose happily city so aptly given by Tibetan most beautiful of garudas with for photographs after the traders of olden times. luminous crystal eyes. inevitable introduction of ‘Hello, Along one side of the far The present contributes one rupee’. This salutation is not reaching square is the Royal pulsating life to what could be an to be confused with begging. It is Palace, apparently begun in the intimidating square. A modern a mere thrust into the great fourteenth century but almost breed of curio dealers spread their unknown world of the outside Patan was a flourishing city when the Emperor Ashoka certainly resting on older wares under huge guardian stone and is invariably followed by a

conversation something like this: visited in 250 BC, and an impressively large one.

○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ Durbar Square today You where from? ○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○○ U.S. a large Nandi that was from time hangs a tale worth telling. The A bamboo scaffolding begins to You American? to time used as a grandstand by king, tired of his royal living, spread across the face of the old Yes. children. Ahead of me, in golden decided to go into retreat in some palace, giving a welcome assurance Capital Washington D.C. silhouette against the tall rise of distant place from which he never that this treasury of Newari art is Right on. the Taleju temple, was the lovely returned. But legend has it that being restored. If the bird knew Okay, bye bye, one rupee. Garuda, kneeling reverently in before he left his sorrowing court where to go, it might fly wildly I stood in the shadow of two prayer, hands and wings folded, and people, he promised he would away to tell the old Malla king the temples to do my sketch, one serpents poised about his face. return so long as the gilded bird good news. And return again to add dedicated to Narayan and the Beyond him, also on a lotus perched upon the gilded serpent. A its romantic tale to a wondrously other, the royal love temple, pedestal, was King Yoganarendra window of this palace is still kept romantic square. t dedicated to Krishna. In no time I Malla, shaded by a rearing open against his return and until a (Excerpted with permission from was surrounded by the curious serpent. On the head of the few years ago his bed and hookah In the Kingdom of the Gods, but my view was well guarded by serpent sits a bird and thereby stood ready for his instant use. HarperCollins, 1999.)

BOOK REVIEW by MARK TURIN Mapping the Tibetoid World

t is surprisingly rare for the content of a book to impartiality, the whole book is distinctly pro-Tibetan. This the editors, is a short section on Other Guidebooks. Rather than arguing live up to its enticing title, but Mapping the respect and appreciation for Tibetan culture that rings loud and (absurdly) that this guide is the only thing a traveller needs, the pros and i Tibetan World, published in December 2000, does clear in the writing may make it difficult for tourists to consult cons of six other Tibet guides are listed. just that. This beautifully produced and quality the book in the open when travelling in Tibet proper, even The single most notable and unique feature of Mapping the Tibetan guidebook to the “Tibetan Cultural Region” (their though there are no explicitly pro-Tibetan political state- World is the abundance of chosen term) brands itself as being suited for the ments. beautifully-drawn line “budget” traveller, but this claim is unduly modest— The introductory cultural and historical sections of the maps. Credit must go to anyone interested in exploring the Tibetan world, budget guide are well written and beautifully illustrated. Although Shozo Tominaga for the backpacker to five-star organised tour group member, short, the editors have managed to pack a generous amount precision and artistic would do well to have this volume in their pocket. of valuable cultural information into very little space without simplicity of the 280 maps There are various features of the guide which deserve making it seem overcrowded. The few pages charmingly entitled in this guide, embodying both special attention and praise. First of all, the writers and editors have Unravelling the Thangka Message are truly insightful and offer an excellent the very best of Japanese masterfully tackled a notoriously difficult geopolitical issue: who defines schematic representation of the various elements of Tibetan Buddhist graphic design. This what Tibetan culture is and how far does it stretch? In the Message from iconography with which one is so frequently confronted when travelling in guidebook is a perfect the Publishers on page 4, the framework is clear: “We have included all of the Tibetan Buddhist world. travel companion for the areas that can be classed as being within the “Tibetan Cultural Region”, Whilst Nepal does feature in the guide, it is only present in as much as anyone journeying in the a classification that cuts across ‘national’ or ‘geopolitical’ boundaries and some parts of the country are distinctly and ethnically Tibetan. The section Tibetosphere. It can be encompasses the areas where the people share a common ancestry, culture on Nepal opens with the Tibetan word for Nepal, bal-yul, superimposed on purchased from and religion.” As a result, along with carefully thought-out route a photo of the stupa at Boudha, and the short section entitled The People Amazon.com and Snow descriptions of the Tibetan Autonomous Region (TAR), there are sections of Nepal explicitly lists only the groups of “Tibetan descent”, under which Lion Publications on Western China, Northern India, Bhutan and Nepal. the editors include “Gurungs & Magars” (page 319). Throughout this (www.snowlionpub.com). Second, in the process of addressing the “what counts as Tibet?” section there is the slight feeling that Nepal is worth visiting because it is an conundrum, they have offered judicious presentations of both the pro- important element of the Tibetan periphery, not because of the antiquity of Mapping the Tibetan World. Kotan Publishing: Reno, NV and Tokyo, Chinese and pro-Tibetan points of view. From page 30 to 34, two the Tibetoid way of life which falls within its borders. As a result of this Japan. 424 pages, 21 colour photos, 286 black & white photos, 32 competing histories of Tibet are offered side by side, from the Chinese and Tibeto-phile and Tibeto-centric perspective, readers of the guide coming to illustrations, over 280 maps. $27.95, £17.95, Japan ¥2,940. t Tibetan viewpoints respectively. This approach is to be applauded, not least Nepal or India for the first time would be forgiven for wondering where all because the editors make it clear that their attempt may have been a the Hindus came from. (Mark Turin is a linguistic anthropologist writing a grammar of the “reckless one for a guidebook” (page 30). In fact, despite a veneer of A welcome touch, and a sign of good sense and humility on the part of Thangmi language spoken in Dolakha and Sindhupalchowk.)

20 5 - 11 JANUARY 2001 NEPALI TIMES

away in the comfort of our own homes, snug and cosy NEPALI SOCIETY Under My Hat in the knowledge that nothing was going to go wrong, because not one person in this glorious land of ours was by Kunda Dixit actually doing anything. It should therefore be every Nepali’s patriotic duty he year has got off to a flying start with two (not just the patriotic duty of the nine bums) to find t Nothing Doing days already. This bodes well for creative new reasons to declare bandhs in 2001: LIZ 2001, and Nepalis can now look forward to an February: Old Diesel Bus Owners will protest the easy-going new millennium in which there will be plenty rising concentration of oxygen in the Valley’s air. The ho was the first to of lazy days that can be devoted to cleaning up our capital’s residents demand their normal daily dose of climb the South Face of nooks and crannies, something we have no time for in diesel soot particles in the 5-10 micron range. w Lhotse alpine style? In the mad rush of a normal office day. There will finally be March: An alliance of seven student unions which year was Dhaulagiri time on our hands to extract wads of lint from inside our threaten to declare a Valley Bandh to demand that the climbed for the first time? Who belly buttons which can be sold in bulk as raw material government make available more tyres for their flaming was Alex McIntyre’s climbing for our nation’s dollar- partner during his attempt on earning pashmina industry, Annapurna in 1983 in which he we can use matchsticks to died? For answers to these mine for globs of wax from Nothing questions and many, many more, deep inside our ear shafts, just ask Elizabeth Hawley, and we can at last gain Nepal’s walking encyclopaedia access to hard-to-reach on mountaineering in Nepal. blackheads and squish Doing When she first arrived in them before they are ripe Nepal in 1959, five years after for eruption. the first tourist came to I don’t know what you Kathmandu, Liz Hawley never did on January 1-2, but I thought she’d stay so long. Forty did nothing. I was bunned. years later, she has firmly Doing nothing is finally established herself as a legendary going to save our chronicler of mountaineering. landlocked Himalayan She has been living in her kingdom of high mountain bungalow in Dilli Bazaar for ranges, beautiful natures, most of the time here driving and much floras and faunas her trademark blue 1963 MIN BAJRACHARYA from self-destruction. We mess up everything we do, so street barricades. Volkswagen Beetle to and from not doing anything lessens the chances of doing April: Hotel guests throughout Nepal go on a the airport to interview something wrong. In the same manner, the chances of week-long strike to demand that their right to tip mountaineers as they flew back our rulers doing the right thing are so remote that the waiters and staff be restored. They threaten to stay on from expeditions. It has become leftist opposition thinks it is a much better idea to have in Nepal indefinitely so that hotel occupancy will be a mandatory ritual for most them just sit at home and not lift a finger. That way the 100 percent for the rest of the year. climbers in Nepal to meet and It has become a mandatory ritual likelihood of someone somewhere wrecking something is May: Petrol-pump shutdown to demand right to brief her on their expeditions. for most climbers in Nepal to meet reduced. Through trial and error over the past 50 years dilute diesel by adding pure Himalayan spring water. Says Liz: “Sometimes it’s as we have finally hit on the right formula for governance in June: Journalists pen-down to protest increased boring as hell. If there are 29 and brief Elizabeth Hawley on their our country: it is better to allow our rulers to goof off workload caused by Congress infighting. teams on Cho-Oyu you get than to have them actually rule. For example, if our July: The Rotary Club of Chapagaon bored with it. But fortunately expeditions. Minister of Rumour and Miscommunication had stayed (Revolutionary) declares a three-day bandh to demand now, I don’t have to meet all of possibly by the end of the year. correspondent for Reuters home to exhume ear wax with a matchstick instead of more bandhs because Rotarians don’t have enough time them. New routes, new But I’m not sure, I wouldn’t and Time. trying to declare war on India, this country may still to keep their nooks and crannies squeaky clean, and the attempts, something new is hold my breath waiting,” says Her reporting spanned the have some spare tyres left. What a relief it was, drop in the number of Nothing Doing Days is seriously always happening.” Liz. She says the growth in the Panchayat years, the subsequent therefore, that on Monday and Tuesday we could snore affecting the pashmina industry. t Word has got around among number of expeditions in Nepal political upheavals, the death of mountaineers and others in is due to a freer political climate King Mahendra, King Birendra’s Kathmandu that Liz does not in Eastern Europe, the easy coronation, and through it all suffer fools. She can be blunt, accessibility of foreign currency, hundreds of successful brusque and impatient. After all, and to increasingly more affluent mountaineering expeditions and she has a deadline to meet. societies like Japan and South tragedies on the mountains. Liz Today, Liz employs two Korea. gave up political reporting for assistants to meet expeditions, Seated in her study, Reuters after her stories on the there is just too much happening surrounded by books, journals 1985 bomb blasts raised hackles during the mountaineering and reference works on in the government. But she still season. But at a sprightly 77, Liz mountaineering, Liz reports on mountaineering and still does many of her interviews acknowledges the guidance of writes for climbing journals in herself. climber and explorer Colonel nine countries. She also continues Liz Hawley’s database of Jimmy Roberts, who enabled her to manage Sir Edmund Hillary’s mountaineering is the product of to become an authority on the charity, the Himalayan Trust and a lifetime of meticulous Nepali Himalaya climbing scene serves as the Honorary Consul for interviews, reporting and without ever setting foot on a New Zealand in Nepal. collection. Much of this mountain. “I like mountain “Nepal is still experiencing information, plus original scenery, I think it’s great, I just growing pains with parliamentary statistical analyses of trends in don’t need to climb them,” she democracy. Things aren’t so rosy climbing in the Nepal Himalaya adds. Liz enjoys Kathmandu’s but then this kind of problem ambassador will be published in a book that climate (“Kathmandu is not occurs when you have a whisky Liz is working on along with under a foot of snow like New combination of great poverty and fellow American, computer York is at the moment”) and it’s an enormous number of expert and climber, Richard easygoing lifestyle where it is unemployed youth who have Salisbury. possible to live comfortably and nothing to do but to throw “We have no idea when we frugally. bricks,” she says. will really finish–we hope When she first came to In 1994, the American Alpine Kathmandu she had quit her job Club, of which she is a member, as an editorial researcher for presented her its literary award. Fortune magazine in New York And in 1998 she was awarded the and had travelled extensively King Albert Medal of Merit through Eastern Europe, the presented by a Swiss foundation Soviet Union, the West and to “persons or institutions who South Asia. “I came back on have distinguished themselves in purpose in September 1960 some way in the mountain because I thought it would be world”. The rapid growth in interesting to see how Nepal was satellite technology and the live going to cope with the 20th coverage of climbing exploits on century,” she says. A year earlier, the web may have undermined her BP Koirala had become Prime role as a mountaineering Minister under a democratic correspondent, but it doesn’t constitution promulgated by seem to prevent Liz from always King Mahendra. This exercise in having the definitive last word. “I parliamentary democracy was am getting scooped. But my short-lived and 19 months later reports give an assessment, quite Koirala was put in jail. Writing often, of the significance of a about it began Liz’s career as climb. They put it in Kathmandu-based foreign perspective.” t MIN BAJRACHARYA