‘Exorbitant’ fee by TUTH angers Australian disabled

By Tashi D. Thinley

KATHMANDU, Dec 12 – Romie John, a 60- year- old Australian, came to Kathmandu on a holiday in the last days of October. In the course of time, he developed a good impression of the Kathmandu City but it was all shattered after a month of his stay in Nepal.

At midnight on November 8, 2001 he felt a strange numbness in his arms and had to be rushed to the Tribhuvan University Teaching Hospital (TUTH) for surgery. But while he was moaning with pain, he says the doctors were for two hours discussing as to who would pay the bill. "Despite my assurance that I would pay, they demanded cash before the surgery," says John.

At 5 am in the morning the doctors finally decided to go ahead with the ‘Embolectomy’, a surgery to remove clot in a blood vessel, after Lyall Crawford, First Secretary and Consul of the Australian Embassy in Kathmandu took the assurance of John’s payment.

Recalling the moment John said, "I know if it had been three hours late, my arms would have been amputated". According to John, he was told the surgery would cost Rs 40,000.

A team under cardiovascular surgeon Dr Uttam Shrestha conducted the surgery. After the operation, John was admitted to the hospital for four days (Nov. 8 - 12) which according to him was Rs 800 per day for a room. On the evening of November 12, he was discharged from the hospital. But he got the shock of his life when he went to clear his bill. John was presented with a bill statement of Rs 130,725. He was charged three times more than what he expected and what he was told.

The discharge statement states that the surgery was conducted for Rs 120,000 (three times more than the actual cost of Rs 40,000) and the bed charge for a day was Rs 2400 instead of Rs 800. He was asked to pay a total of Rs 130,725.

When he contacted the surgeons and the administration, he was told that since he was a foreigner, the hospital fees were unquestionably more. But John argued that he was born in Calcutta though he has an Australian passport. When he showed his birth certificate, the hospital administrators simply said that he had to pay the considerable bill simply because he was white.

Director of TUTH Dr Mahendra Kumar Nepal says, "He did show us the birth certificate but we only look at the passport to which it is clear that he resides there in Australia. So we have no consideration as such."

But John is also an Australian Disabled Pensioner and is adamant that he will not pay the extra amount that they charged him for being a "white". "This is sheer discrimination and I want to clarify this that not all whites are rich," John says.

Meanwhile, Dr Nepal takes a firm stand that TUTH does have the policy of charging foreigners three times more whether it is just for first aid or surgery. He said, "The foreigners have health insurance when they go outside their own country, so it should not make any difference to them whatsoever the charges are".

The Ministry of Health (MoH) confirmed that they don’t have any policies on how much hospitals can charge foreigners. Dr Benu Bahadur Karki, Chief of Policy and Planning at the MoH says, "As far as I know, there is no such policies like this for the hospitals under the MoH".

But since TUTH is an autonomous hospital, wherein the board members make the policies, John’s appeal is not taken seriously. But he says, if nothing happens, "I will take the matter to the court."

Photo show to mark golden jubilee of Boris’ arrival

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KATHMANDU, Dec 12 - Boris Lissanevich, internationally known as "Boris from Kathmandu", is considered as the pioneer of tourism development in Nepal. Proprietor of Royal Hotel, now converted into Yak & Yeti, Boris is said to have a very big hand in putting Nepal firmly on the world tourism map.

To honour late Boris’s contribution to Nepal and also to mark the golden jubilee of his arrival in Kathmandu, Boris’s wife, Sir Edmund Hillary and writer and climber, Victor Klenov in conjunction with Shangri-La Hotel and Cultural and Educational Fund, a St-Petersburg-based organisation, will be putting up an exhibition of the legend’s photographs and books related to his life.

The exhibition will take place at The Shangri-La Hotel on Thursday and Friday and continue for almost a month, after that in the Russian Cultural Centre here in the capital, the organisers said in a press conference held here Wednesday.

Boris was a good friend of such great figures like A.Matiss and J.Cocto, S.Dali, Prince Basundhara, E. Hillary and Tenzing Norgay and late King Tribhuvan. The late King had invited Boris to Nepal in 1951.

Boris created the first airline, Himalayan Aviation, to fly to Nepal and also operated the first European-standard hotel in Kathmandu. "He has a big hand in attracting tourists and visitors to Nepal and thus helping in the growth of tourism," Klenov told a packed press conference.

He considered Nepal as his second motherland and he loved Nepal and its people. He became successful as a live bridge between the East and the West. He was also a one-man institute, unofficial envoy from Nepal as well as the co-chairman of Tibetan Refugee Committee

"Boris’s contributions have been immense in the growth of tourism in Nepal and can rightly be called ‘Father of Tourism in Nepal’," said a statement issued at the press conference. "His contribution has extended not only in tourism but also in the social and cultural life in Nepal."

Mainali felicitated

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KATHMANDU, Dec 12 – Senior artist Lain Singh Bangdel felicitated comedian Gopal Raj Mainali with Nabin Award,which carries a purse of Rs 30,000, amidst a function here today.

From the award amount he received, Mainali presented Rs 20,000 to Sisnopani – Nepal (SN) for the promotion of humour and satire programmes. SN is an organisation formed to promote humour and satire across the country

Mainali has been working as a comedian actor in the Nepali cinema for many decades. The programme was organised by the Nabin Kala Mandir.

Red Cross flays attack on ambulance

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KATHMANDU, Dec 12 - The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) and the Nepal Red Cross Society (NRCS) are very concerned about the attack on an NRCS ambulance on 9 December along the Gularyia-Nepalgunj highway, a statement issued by the two organisations said here Wednesday.

On 9 December, an ambulance belonging to the (NRCS) and carrying one ill woman hit a pressure-cooker bomb, causing the front of the vehicle to explode. The driver is reportedly heavily injured, while the patient and her family members (3 in total) are unharmed.

The statement said, "the ambulance was clearly marked with a red cross, which, under international humanitarian law is a protective device. The emblem is meant to show combatants that certain people (Red Cross/Crescent volunteers, medical personnel, ICRC delegates...), medical units (hospitals, first aid stations..) and means of transport (ambulances, boats, helicopters) are protected by the Geneva Conventions and their Additional Protocols."

"The emblem, when used as a protective device, must arouse among combatants a reflex of restraint and respect, and such people, medical units and means of transport should not be a military target to neither sides of the conflict. The ICRC and the NRCS reiterate that attacking or occupying facilities marked with the red cross emblem constitutes a violation of international humanitarian law." the statement said.

Show cause on revenue case

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KATHMANDU, Dec 12 - The Supreme Court today passed a show cause order in connection with a petition about the recommendations of Auditor General and the parliamentary Public Accounts Committee on revenue mobilisation and public expenditure.

A single bench comprised of Chief Justice Keshav Prasad Upadhyaya passed the order in the name of the government to furnish reply why the orders as demanded by the petitioners is not to be delivered.

The order comes in response to a writ petition filed by Advocates Prakash Mani Sharma and Mihir Kumar Thakur of Pro-Public.

The writ was filed by the duo seeking that the court issue mandamus and other appropriate orders. The writ had argued that it was necessary for Finance Ministry and the Cabinet Secretariat and other concerned government agencies to implement the recommendations and directive issued by the Auditor General, Parliamentary Public Accounts Committee concerning the reforms in maintenance of fiscal discipline, revenue mobilisation and management of public expenditure.

Census results likely in two months

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KATHMANDU, Dec 12 - It will take at least two months to make public the final results of the Tenth National Census, said officials at the Central Bureau of Statistics (CBS).

"As more than 50 percent of the work has already been completed, it will not exceed two months to make public the final results,"said Radha Krishna G.C., Deputy Director of the CBS.

G.C. added, "50 per cent of the data compiled in the Tenth National Census has already been processed. Only after the process of data processing, they will be analysed."

CBS officials are currently busy in Post-enumeration Survey (PES) to check the error percentage that occurred in the Census. They claim that the error percentage will be much less this Census than the previous ones.

"Since PES used this time is more scientific than the previous censuses, error percentage is likely to come down," said Rabindra Prasad Kayastha, deputy director of CBS.

Last Census recorded 11 per cent as error percentage. CBS officials claim that since they will once again visit the field to verify the data gathered in PES, the error per cent will automatically come down.

"CBS will send its officials for the field visit to verify the data gathered in PES. Since it has already been five months since the completion of Census exercise, there may be some changes," Said Bishnu Das Dangol, United Nations Population Funds (UNFPA) consultant for PES.

Lagan to have drinking water

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KATHMANDU, Dec 12 - The local residents of Lagan, ward No. 21, are getting plenty of drinking water as the Nepal Water Supply Corporation (NWSC) is constructing a huge water reservoir and distributing drinking water from the reservoir soon, an official said today.

The open space of Lagan lies at a higher level than the surrounding area in the city and scarcity of water has been a long problem there. The locals humorously re-define the name of the area as "Laa gana", which in the Newari language means water has dried up.

"The construction of the water reservoir with 200,000 litre water capacity will be complete in two months. We hope this scheme will relieve the locals of Lagan and also some surrounding areas from the continued problem of drinking water," said Krishna Prasad Kandel, the chief of Production Improvement Project of NWSC.

A treatment plant will be set up and water will be pumped out, treated and then distributed to the locals, according to the officials.

He said the construction of the reservoir will cost around Rs 1.5 millions and the water problem in the area would be resolved after three months.

According to site engineer Rabi Rai, the task of deep boring was complete some two years ago but the drinking water distribution scheme was delayed due to the lack of place for treatement plants.

"Actually, it is an old project. We dug a 300-metre deep well in 1998 planning to set up a treatment plant at a open space there but the locals did not allow it saying it would affect the annual festival of Machchhendranath chariot procession."

Rai said NWSC was getting a small piece of land at Army Silkhana office to make a treatment plant.

Project chief Kandel said that the construction of deep-well "might affect the surrounding old houses" but that would not damage them.

Ward No. 21 Chairman Bidya Sundar Shakya said the project would solve the decades-long problem of drinking water in the Lagan area.

"Be it piped fresh water or that from deep-boring, the locals need drinking water. They are desperately in need of drinking water," he said.

Seminar on HIV control held

KATHMANDU, Dec 12 (PR) – A one-day seminar on Prevention and Control of HIV/AIDS and STD, organised by the Ministry of Health and the National Centre for AIDS and STD Control (NCASC), was held here today.Many of the ministries participated in the seminar.

The seminar discussed the current scenario of HIV/AIDS worldwide and Nepal in particular. Dr B. D Chataut, Executive Director of the Department of Health, presenting various data on the global scenario of HIV/AIDS, said that more than 95 percent of the infection is in the developing countries and in the year 2001, there will be 14,000 new infection a day.

And in the context of Nepal, he said, "Even when the reports at the NCASC as of December 2001 show only 2109 HIV positives, it is estimated that 40,000 people are living with HIV".

Of the total infected people, experts have specially raised concerns over the growing infection in the productive age group (15 – 40 years) which according to them can deter the economic, social and development sector of the nation.

Also speaking at the programme Health Minister Sharat Singh Bhandari said, "Since the AIDS drugs are unaffordable and unreliable, we all have to come out of the social stigma and change our behaviour because there is no room for regret."

All the concerned officials stressed that the prevention and control of HIV/AIDS should be a multi-sector approach and that advocacy should reach the grass roots level.

Passengers decline in night buses

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MORANG, Dec 12 - Passengers travelling from eastern regions to different parts of the country by night bus service has declined by 75 per cent after the proclamation of the state of emergency, concerned officials here said.

Several district administration offices in the eastern region had imposed a ban on operating night bus service citing security reasons about a week ago. But the decision was reviewed the next day making it mandatory to all the night buses to cross Lahan area by eight p. m. Despite the revision on the previous decision, people are not willing to travel at night as they have to pass through security checks in several points.

Before the state of emergency, around 60 night buses used to ply on the national highway from Jhapa, 13 from Dharan, 13 from Biratnagar, three from Ilam, one from Dhankuta and 10 from the neighbouring areas on regular basis. Night bus operators claimed that at present only two buses were in operation from Biratnagar, the second largest industrial city after the capital.

Bus operators said though they have been operating their night bus service as allowed by the local administrations, they lacked enough passengers to travel at night hour.

Treasurer of the Kosi Bus Entrepreneurs’ Association, Bhim Prasad Adhikari, said that the number of people travelling at night had declined almost by 75 per cent shortly after the declaration of the emergency. "We are running at losses as the night buses lack minimum occupancy of the available seats since the emergency," said Adhikari.

One of the main reason behind the non-availability of passengers has been blamed for the curfews in several places and tight security checks at several points. People cannot get their destinations on time because they have to spend hours just to get their belongings checked by the security personnel.

But day-bus operators say they had adequate passengers as usual as most of the people have started travelling at daytime after the emergency.

Security personnel arrest hundreds of Maoists

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KATHMANDU, Dec 12 - After the declaration of the state of emergency, the Royal Nepal Army (RNA) and Nepal Police have arrested hundreds of Maoists across the country and an equal number have surrendered to the local authorities, reports received here today said.

A report from Parbat said that eight Maoists were sent to jail under the purview of the recently-promulgated Royal ordinance, which seeks to control terrorist and destructive acts. Police have also arrested Parbat District Development Committee
member and Deputy-Secretary of the main opposition CPN-UML, Udaya Subedi, on charges of assisting the rebel outfit. Security sources today said they arrested about three dozen Maoists from various villages.

In Nawalparasi, 10 people were imprisoned on charges of their association with the rebels. Of the 28 suspected Maoists arrested over the last few days, six people have been released from detention. While searching the house of one Kedar Parajuli of Chormara, the police
seized a video cassette of Maoist leaders addressing mass meetings during the cease-fire period. The police said that the cassette would help in identifying other "terrorists."

Our reporter from Panchthar quoted the Chief District Officer as saying that 54 Maoist supporters have surrendered to the local administration since the emergency was declared two weeks ago. CDO Jeevan Prasad Oli said that some local-level Maoist leaders were also among those who gave up. He added that four people were sent to jail under the new ordinance, which allows the CDO to detain a person if he is suspected of being involved in anti-state activities.

In Taplejung, the number of Maoists surrendering to the administration rose to 37 with eight more people giving themselves up on Wednesday. Meanwhile, Three Maoists have been taken into police custody for investigation, sources said.

The district administration office in Ramechhap said that around 500 Maoists of various ranks have surrendered to local authorities since the emergency was declared. CPN-UML District Secretary, Dev Shankar Poudel, said more than 1,100 Maoists have so far appealed for general amnesty at his party office. Officials at the district working committee of the governing Nepali Congress said they have received 156 applications requesting for surrender. Ramechhap is one of the Maoist strongholds in the central region.

Our reporter from Chautara, the district headquarters of Sindhupalchowk, said 32 Maoists, who were the members of People’s Government formed by the rebels at Mangkha VDC, have surrendered to the government. Officials of the VDC had accepted the resignation tendered by the rebels from their respective posts.

Meanwhile, the soldiers of the RNA and police on Tuesday arrested four Maoists, including a teacher of a local school, during their search operation in Syamgha VDC in Tanahun district.

A report from Bardiya in the mid-western region stated that the rebels bombed to destruction an unoccupied police outpost and a building of Sajha Sanstha at Baniyabhar VDC, about 10 kilometres away from the district headquarters of Gulariya on Tuesday night. The explosions could be heard as far away as Gulariya, locals said. A police reinforcement team has been dispatched to the area to flush out the rebels.

Similarly, the Parsa Chief District Officer said they would look into the applications of some 40 Maoists who wished to surrender before him. An investigation committee has been formed in the district administration office to handle the Maoist appeals. CDO Narayan Gopal Malego said those Maoists who are found to be innocent of any criminal acts, would be pardoned but punitive actions will be taken against the others.

Dang revenue office to update records

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DANG, Dec 12 - The Dang Land Revenue Office has issued an appeal to the general public to make restraint until all the land related records of the office are updated. Most of the office documents were reduced to a cinder after the Maoist rebels attacked the building and set it on fire on November 23.

Officials said it would take at least two months to begin with official jobs as most of the records were destroyed due to the fire on the office building.

This public notice was issued with a view to updating the records of all the documents related to land and its ownership, which were lost in the Maoist attacks, said Land Revenue Officer Abdul Kalam Khan. He added that transfer of any private land and transactions have been withheld for an indefinite period of time as they had to restart the work from the beginning.

The 35-day public notice has appealed the people to provide whatever evidence they possess to the office so that latter could develop its records lost during the Maoist attacks.

The office has also noticed to all concerned government
offices nation-wide to provide the official documents related to the freezing of land transaction in Dang district. The office further stated that work of the office could be resumed only after updating the records of all the documents related with land.

The Land Revenue Office had also sought instructions from the Department of Land Revenue regarding the working procedures of the district office. Khan said it would take at least two months to prepare all the papers.

Houses for ex-Kamaiyas

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DHANGADI, Dec 12 – After seventeen months of liberation, the ex-Kamaiyas’ dream for a house to live in has come true as the Chief District Officer of Kailali Wednesday laid the foundation stone of a house for ex-Kamaiyas.

Chief District Officer (CDO) of Kailali Khagendra Dev Joshi on Wednesday laid the foundation stone of a timber-house at Srilanka village of Geta village development committee of Kailai amidst a function.

The government has planned to finish rehabilitating the bonded labours by mid February next year. The government is providing ten thousand rupees for each family and 75 cubic feet of timber for the construction of house.

Speaking on the foundation laying programme, CDO Joshi said that the government is committed to make provision of health, education, employment for Kamaiyas.

Backward Society Education (BSE) and Save the Children US are also supporting the Kamaiyas rehabilitation programme by offering roof tins for the houses and other expenses of house construction. Speaking on the occasion, Khadga Bahadur Chapagain, coordinator of Kamaiya Rehabilitation Committee distributed lands to the ex- Kamaiyas of the district. There are 2647 families of ex-Kamaiyas in Kailai.

According to Dilli Bahadur Chaudhari, chairman of the BSE, 84 houses will be constructed in Srilanka and 205 houses in Dhangadi municipality will be constructed in the first phase of house constructing programme.