Meanwhile, the Economy

#481 18 - 24 December 2009 16 pages Rs 30 KIRAN PANDAY/GANESH PANDEY Meanwhile, the economy.. ey ministers in the cabinet Nepal’s trade deficit with economy. MAN FOR ALL ‘TREASONS’: are in Copenhagen, the India is now a whopping Rs100 Banks are heavily exposed Maoist Chairman Pushpa K Maoist opposition is billion and growing every quarter. with unproductive consumer Kamal Dahal has shown us gearing up for a total national While the balance of payments lending and real estate with long- how versatile he is, but what shutdown from next week, and was still healthy, Nepal paid for term gestation, exacerbating the has he really done for the common people? efforts to find a way to bring the goods imported from India in cash crunch. Interest rates have Maoists back into government remittance and tourism dollars. recently climbed up to 16 per have failed so far. The Maoists But money transfers from Nepalis cent, dampening business. themselves are spending their working abroad have plateaued. On 1 January, Nepal will have time flying around the country Overall exports are down, and the to open up its services sector declaring ethnic autonomous fuel import bill is up by 90 per including banking to foreign councils and have threatened a cent from last year. There has investors under WTO rules. This ‘parallel government’. been a three-fold increase in will mean that smaller banks and In all these fun and games, vehicle imports this year, which finance companies will find it none of the national players have will mean another spike in fuel even harder to survive. z given any thought to a looming imports in 2010. All this will economic emergency. The put further pressure on rupee banking sector is facing a parity with India. EAT DRINK AND liquidity crisis the likes of which “The economy is a soap MAKE MERRY this country hasn’t seen, bubble, it can go any moment,” remittance growth is down, the said one senior government trade deficit with India is adviser who is worried that the growing, domestic production is ministers have no time to think down and consumer spending is about medium and long-term up. Everything is pointing to an interventions to rescue the economic crisis stemming from prolonged political uncertainty and instability. Special Holiday Supplement p8-9 2 EDITORIAL 18 - 24 DECEMBER 2009 #481 Published by Himalmedia Pvt Ltd, Editor: Kunda Dixit Desk Editor: Rabi Thapa CEO: Ashutosh Tiwari Design: Kiran Maharjan DGM Sales and Marketing: Sambhu Guragain [email protected] Marketing Manager: Subhash Kumar Asst. Manager: Arjun Karki Hatiban, Godavari Road, Lalitpur Fax: 5251013 [email protected] GPO Box 7251, Kathmandu 5250333/845 www.nepalitimes.com Printed at Jagadamba Press 5250017-19 We’re with you Delhi appears to be th ro w ing THE GOLDEN MIDDLE its weight behind th e Nepal Army For those who are having a tough time deciding which political New Delhi – At a reception hosted treatment. Their support to the The bottom line is that until party is the least of all evils, there is a simple test. Just figure out by General Chhatraman Singh Nepali state and the Nepal Army the Maoists reform themselves; which one uses violence as a political tool and which one doesn’t. For the Maoists, despite having won an election and entered Gurung in the lawns of the has been conveyed in clear accept multi-party democracy in the political mainstream, the standard operating procedure is still expansive Nepal embassy grounds terms.” principle and practice; entirely violence, intimidation and terror. In fact, it is their unique selling here on Tuesday, the who’s who Both sides insisted that it settle the PLA question and point. of the Indian defence was a conventional goodwill disband the YCL; return seized What we fail to grasp is why governments that would not establishment made an visit. But the underlying property; and agree to be a tolerate the use of violence and terror in their own countries are appearance. Indian Army chief political message and concerns constructive opposition, instead sympathetic to those who refuse to renounce violence here. The General Deepak Kapoor; General were hard to miss. There was a of the ‘irresponsible’ one they moral double standards are most glaring in the way the national Gurung’s batch mates from the sense that the Nepal Army had have been, their participation in army is being hauled over the coals for atrocities committed during just passed through a difficult the government – far from the war while murder and mayhem after the war by the Maoists political challenge, and may face leading it – is out of the doesn’t elicit commensurate opprobrium. PLAIN SPEAKING testing times again, during which question. Journalists have been killed and beaten up, it’s open season Prashant Jha on citizens, there is an epidemic of extortion and seizure of it will have India’s full But there is also a recognition personal property nationwide, and there have been murders inside support. that this is not happening. The camps ostensibly under UNMIN supervision. In informal conversations, the Maoists are seen to have upped The army’s culpability in disappearances, summary execution Indian Military Academy, now in Indian defence brass conveyed its the ante and become even more and torture during the war years needs to be addressed in a court the top echelons of the military; desire to see a ‘democratic, ‘obstructionist’. Earlier, there of law, just as Maoist atrocities. But the one-sided hounding of the PM’s special envoy Shyam Saran; professional, and apolitical’ was a feeling that this was meant state army is provoking a dangerous rightwing backlash that could defence attaches from foreign army. The argument was that the to boost their bargaining push the country back to war. embassies; and retired and serving Nepal Army is the only stable strength. More recently, Maoist Only the naïve still believe that the land-grabbers across the diplomats queued up to greet the institution in the Nepali state, activities have given Delhi the country this week are poor landless peasants, or that this is any Nepal Army chief. and the only force capable of impression that the situation more about the liberation of the downtrodden. The revolution may The bonhomie was palpable. standing up to the Maoists. may spiral out of control. The have been genuinely for the emancipation of the marginalised at one time, but a recent swing through the heartland convinces us it The old tradition of honouring Former Maoist combatants will next few months are seen as has now largely degenerated into a nationwide crime syndicate. the army chief of a neighbour had be welcome to join as individual crucial and if there is no broad Land-grabbing, smuggling, trafficking, contraband, extortion, just been given continuity. Nepali citizens after meeting the agreement soon, Delhi believes kidnappings, illegal boulder and sand mining, the decimation of General Kapoor’s Nepal visit itself established criteria. But there the country may slide into a community forests, district construction contracts: you name it and is in the pipeline. The should be no integration in a violent confrontation. the comrades have their paws in the cookie jar. And any district conversation hovered around manner that would ‘politicise’ Noone here believes that the journalist exposing this is immediately threatened. ‘traditional and historic’ army-to- the army and harm its constitution will be written by To be sure, there are criminal mafias also involved, and the NC army ties. The Indian army brass ‘institutional integrity’. The May or knows with any and UML are no saints, but the was impressed Maoists were ‘untrustworthy and precision what will happen after Maoists have taken politicisation with General had to compromise’. When the that. Any kind of presidential and crime and the criminalisation Gurung’s Maoist argument about how takeover is not a preferred of politics to new heights. The party is always right, and the party never ‘sober and integration was necessary to outcome, for Delhi understands has to say sorry in this Orwellian apolitical’ change the army’s ‘feudal that it would not be a world. And those who call it like it outlook. “He character’ was pointed out, a top sustainable political is are conveniently labelled class is focused and Indian general responded, “Is arrangement. But if the Maoists enemies and status quoists out to knows where your present army chief a feudal? ‘push the country into conflict’, protect privileges. Pushpa Kamal the army’s job Don’t fall for Maoist rhetoric.” then anything may happen. Dahal’s chilling warning that one ends and the Across the Indian India is now deeply worried million Nepalis may have to “swim government’s establishment, there is a about the unfolding events in in blood” is a sign that the job begins. consensus that the Maoists Nepal. It recognises that the Chairman is trapped by his own And he is a intend to capture the Nepali state process it initiated may be in its populist rhetoric and the promises very and establish a form of death throes. But the consensus he made to his cadre which he now can’t fulfill. intelligent totalitarian rule. The non-Maoist is that the onus rests entirely on Nepal’s tragedy is that the man,” said a Nepali political class has the Maoists to reform, democratic parties that don’t have top Indian conveyed the same impression to compromise, and cooperate. If a violent ideology and which should officer. And a Delhi. The sense is that too many that does not happen, Delhi feels have been real alternatives to the member of the concessions have been made to Nepal will head into a ‘conflict Maoists are so weak, fractured and Nepali the Maoists in the past and this between multiparty system and feckless.

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