CSWs and IDUs prone to AIDS

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KATHMANDU, Sept 29 - The two most risk-prone groups for contracting HIV/AIDS are Commercial Sex Workers (CSWs) and Intravenous Drug Users (IDUs), health experts said at a review workshop here today.

CSWs and IDUs added to high HIV epidemic during the past decade, former health minister Prof Mathura Shrestha said, quoting the findings of nine separate studies conducted in as many districts of the country.

Shrestha was speaking at the two-day workshop organised by National Centre for AIDS and STD Control (NCASC) to review the first phase of national strategy to control HIV/AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases (STDs).

With support from UNDP, NCASC had launched a 12-year-programme in 1988 to control STDs and HIV/AIDS in the nine districts, said Mahesh Sharma, National Programme Manager for HIV/AIDS at UNDP. The districts are Doti, Makawanpur, Rupandehi, Syangja, Dadeldhura, Sunsari, Parsa, Morang and Achham, he said.

The workshop was attended by representatives from all the concerned districts. "The workshop will make strategies for second phase which will start next January," organisers said.

Passengers stranded

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MUSIKOT (Rukum), Sept 29 - Air passengers travelling home from this remote hill district have been stranded at Salle, airport, Rukum due to frequent last-minute cancelation of scheduled flights of the national flag carrier RNAC - Royal Nepal Airlines Corporation - and the Yeti Airlines, a private operator. The disruption of flights from Nepalgunj to Salle have put the passengers in an unwarranted mental agony.

The flights of RNAC and Yeti Airlines have been stalled since last Wednesday because of technical defects on single-side-band (SSB) at Salle airport, informed Shusila KC, chief of civil aviation authority of Nepal (CAAN) at Salle. The SSB helps to maintain communications between the tower and an aircraft in flight.

Most employees from this Maoist insurgency-hit district are seen eagerly waiting for the resumption of flights in the hope to reach home for Dashain.

Regional Director of RNAC Nagendra Raya said delayed-flights to Salle airport would operate soon after the repairs of the SSB machinery is completed.

Air service is the only means of transportation to connect this inaccessible district with the rest of the Kingdom.

Literary award to MaHa

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POKHARA, Sept 29 - Artistes  Madan Krishna Shrestha and Hari Bansha Acharya have been selected for the Shukla Literary Award. The award is given away to personalities for their outstanding contribution in the fields of Nepali language,literature, music and art every two years.

The prize is to be awarded jointly to the duo on first November at a function in Batulechour, Pokhara as stated by the Award Committee. The prize, which consists of Rs twenty thousand one hundred one, was constituted in 2045 BS.

Fertilizer crisis likely

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BIRGUNJ, Sept 29 - Nepal is likely to suffer from the shortage of chemical fertilizers during this winter as private importers have not shown any interest in its import. The lack of interest is due to the removal of subsidy on chemical fertilizers.

According to the government officials, Nepal would require one thousand metric tonnes of urea for the season to start in mid-October. Since the government has been able to import sixty thousand metric tonnes only, a shortage of forty thousand tonnes is expected, they said.

"We have been trying to recover the deficit but things are not going as expected," said Dr Birendra Bir Basnyat, head of the Chemical Fertilizer Unit, adding "there is going to be shortage of urea this time." "The responsibility has to be taken by the private sector. They used to import as long as subsidy was there and now they do not seem interested," he added.

According to Babulal Chachan, president of Birgunj Chamber of Commerce and Industry, private sector has not tried to import fertilizers because of its price rise in the international market and removal of the subsidy. Chachan said, "We will import only if the government guarantees the sale of our fertilizers and assures against the low quality fertilizer smuggled from India."

Presently, chemical fertilizer in Nepali market is available at Rs 8,900 per tonne but the same could cross 14 thousand rupees if imported from international market. However, India is supplying fertilisers at the earlier price.

20 kgs tumour removed

POKHARA, Sept 29 (PR)  - Doctors, at the Fishtail Hospital, operating in the stomach of Prem Kumari Gurung, 55, of Birauta, Pokhara sub-metropolis-17,  have successfully removed a twenty kg tumour, said hospital sources.

A three-member medical team comprising Doctors Pradeep Ghimire, Goma Tulachan and Bhupi Tulachan removed the Gurung's tumour in a surgical operation lasting two hours early this morning.

According to Dr Ghimire, this is the first time that such a huge tumour has been removed from any patient in Pokhara.

Gurung was rushed to hospital after she suffered severe pain on Thursday,according to Bhim,Gurung's son. Such types of tumours had been operated upon in Bharatpur and Dhangadhi hospitals a few years back. Dr Ghimire said that one can suffer from chronic cancer unless such tumour is detected and removed in time.

Pay hike gap widening : GEFONT

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KATHMANDU, Sept 29 - The gap between the civil servants' and that of labourers' pay hike has been widening during the decade since the restoration of democracy, said a trade union leader here today.

Presenting a 10-year-survey report on trade union movement, General Federation of Nepalese Trade Union (GEFONT) General Secretary Bishnu Rimal said that there can be no comparison between the rise in pay scale of civil servants and labourers.

"There has been a rise from 50 to 100 percent in the pay of civil servants in the latest revision of pay hike, while only 18 percent increase in the case of wage earners," said Rimal.

In the previous pay scale, the highly skilled labourers' wage was higher than that of peon of civil service, but with the recent revision, the peons' salary exceeds that of highly-skilled labourers, Rimal said.  

The Survey Report states that there has been improvement in the working condition of the labourers. Sexual  harassment and other harassments of the working people are declining. However, seeking clarification is on the rise, states the report.

There has been increment in provident fund, accidental compensation and other social security benefits in the past 10 years, states the report.

Poverty haunts Dopla ahead of Dashain

By J Pandey

DUNAI,(Dolpa) Sept 29 - Majority of the people in  Dolpa who live in abject poverty have to face now a bigger financial load and psychological trauma after the Maoist rebels ransacked the local bank last Sunday. Many of them had saved their  money for the Dashain festival.

Many employees who were about to leave the district for Dashain are now penniless after the rebels looted the Nepal Bank Limited branch in Dunai.

The routined administrative works of government offices and development activities have come to a complete halt because of cash crunch.

 Last year, the people of this poverty-striken Himalayan district had no need to shed tear during the Dashain festival despite their poverty or food crunch.

This year's Dashain will leave a deep scar in their heart. "We lost all at our disposal--Dashain as well as our money," the locals say.

"Dashain has started. We do not have a single grain of rice. The shopkeepers do not lend anything and we have no money right now," says Dhani Khatri, one of the locals whose money was robbed by the rebels on the Sunday night.

"The rebels have looted all my cash which I had saved to buy clothes for my beloved children during Dashain. We are now starving even for the day's meal," says Khatri, wife of a lower-ranked employee in Rukum.

They lost Rs 76,000 deposited at the bank last Sunday night when the rebels attacked this small hamlet with heavy bombs and ammunitions.

"It is a heinous crime to loot the money of a poor man like me specially during Dashain," says Ratna Khatri, who now hangs around the plundered bank with a bleak hope of withdrawing some money from his accounts.

The rebels had robbed a total of four thousand saving accounts, 625 current accounts and 20 fixed deposit accounts along with Rs 350 millions that was brought here from Nepalgunj-based central bank--The Rastra Bank.

"Nine employees hailing from outside had to burrow money even to reach their home," says Kiran Shrestha, a cashier at the bank.

Almost half a million rupees of Saraswoti Higher Secondary School, the only plus-two institution in the district, has also gone into the hands of the rebels.

"The money collected penny-by-penny will now be misused for  killing innocent people," a teacher at the school said, "They have not only deprived us of education but even plundered the  judiciary."

The rebels also looted Arna Bahadur Shahi, an assistant accountant, of Rs 36,000 which he had withdrawn from the bank a few days back and had kept in his office vault, especially for the coming Dashain. "I lost both money and Dashain," Shahi laments.

A fifteen-member family of Dhana Bahadur Rokaya too has been deprived of Dashain celebration. He  will not be able to afford new clothes for his family. The aged Rokaya had come here covering an arduous journey from the Rimi VDC to withdraw his pension from the bank. He was quite disappointed on seeing the pathetic state in Dunai.

"What to do! I am so poor! They looted the bank also. They have committed a great sin at the time of Dashain, says Rokaya, who returned home empty-handed.

Similarly, heart-breaking is the condition of Jun Kumari Budha of Dunai-3, who was sobbing alone in a dark room. Her husband, a peon at the district police office, was killed inside the police office building.

Two sisters of the deceased peon, who had not seen him since the last year cursed the rebels saying they meet the similar death as they planned on the innocent poor.