Komatsu brings Mustang to Babarmahal

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KATHMANDU, Nov. 22 – Kenichi Komatsu has been visiting Nepal for the last twelve years and has always been visiting the Himalayan district of Mustang since then.

This Japanese photo journalist is so overwhelmed by the natural beauty of the place that he now wishes to spend his last days in Mustang.

His love for the place has prompted him to take so many photographs that he has managed to publish four thick books, depicting the life of the people living in the difficult Himalayan terrain and their natural beauty.

"My aim in life is to take pictures of people living in the difficult geographical and climatic conditions around the world," says Komatsu. His main theme of life is the Japanese literature, lifestyle and global environmental issues.

And, for the first time, Komatsu has decided to bring his photographic talent to the Nepalese people. His photo exhibition kicked off here today, which has been organised by Japan-Nepal Photographic Exchange Society.

The photographs are displayed under the theme "The Gods of the Mountain Kingdom-Himalaya Mustang-Dolpa" and "Himalaya Nepal- Pilgrimage of the Old Temples." The exhibition displays more than fifty of Komatsu’s exquisite works and four of his books about Nepal and his other publications. The books and the photographs are also for sale.

Komatsu was initially a newspaper journalist and later took interest in photojournalism. Though he has taken up photography as a profession, he still shows keen interest in writing, which has made him a very successful writer in his country. He has released more than 40 publications so far. His writing works are mostly books focused on issues concerning the Japanese youths. His publications include "The Gods of the Mountain Kingdom-Himalaya Mustang-Dolpa," "The Truth of Mustang," and "Mustang- The Unexplored Regions: Trip of a Father and a Son."

He many national and international awards to his credit- both in the field of writing and photography. Komatsu’s works are on display at the Nepal Art Council Gallery, Babarmahal and will continue till December 7, 2001.

Six overhead bridges to be constructed

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KATHMANDU, Nov 22 - Mayor of Kathmandu Keshav Sthapit Thursday laid the foundation stone of a overhead bridges across the newly broadened road joining Bhadrakali and Ratnapark, amid a religious function.

The bridge, being constructed at the cost of Rs three million by Innovative Concept Nepal (ICN) is the first of the six such bridges Kathmandu Metropolitan City (KMC) is building with partnership of private parties.

On the occasion the mayor said that building of the city would not be a big hurdles in the future as different components of the society have learning to sit together for works.

Senior Superintendent of Police, Keshav Prasad Badal said making of overhead bridges only would not solve the problem of traffic." Besides making the bridge, the citizens should also be taught to use the bridges," Badal added.

Director General of ICN Paras Mani Baral said that the bridges would be complete in two months.

Chief Executive of KMC Surya Silwal said that the overhead bridge being built could be an example that KMC wants to work with the private parties and include them into development works.

He added that new overhead bridges are being built in Ratnapark, Tripureshowr, Chabahil, Balaju and City Buspark in recent future.

"This project is materialization of our policy to promote private party’s participation in public works."

KMC allowed ICN to build the bridges in condition that it will construct them and pay certain amount to KMC which it will earn by leasing the space under the bridge and selling advertisements.

KMC to send computerised bills

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KATHMANDU,Nov 22 - Kathmandu Metropolitan City(KMC) is sending computerised bills of land-property tax for the locals of ward No. 1, 11, 31, 32 and 33 shortly, an official said today.

Amrit Man Singh, the technical consultant at ADB Technical Assistant Project said that the locals would be asked to pay the tax as per the bill according to the law.

"The bills of ward No 1 was dispatched Wednesday. And we are sending a monitoring team at ward No 11 to verify the bills we have produced. And the same process is adapted to for ward Nos. 31, 32 and 33 too," he said.

The project is supporting the KMC develop an infrastructure to collect land-property tax in past several months. The amount of tax is decided as per the Local Self-Governance Regulations, which takes the size, building material and age of house while determining the tax.

Local Self-Governance Act 1998 article 140 permits municipalities to draw property tax in the area.

Those who own house property less than Rs one million are exempted from the tax. Having a house that costs Rs one to two million requires to pay Rs 300 monthly. And an owner of over Rs 100 million house needs to pay 1.5 percent of his property every year.

Adding the KMC have made the whole process easier recently, he said the locals could contact the ward office if there is any mistake found in the bill before paying the tax.

"It was very difficult to get information about the land-property of the citizens as they did not want to disclose their property to tax officers during the data collection stage," Singh added.

Ram Sharan Humagain, the chief of Revenue Department of KMC, said that collecting tax has become quite easy because of the new billing system.

"KMC has made a record of collecting revenue out of land-property tax many times more than what the government did in its 40 years of history," he said.

Humagain claimed one single person paid Rs 600,000 annually for his house in Kathmandu.

Earlier, Internal Revenue Department took charge of collecting land-property tax but the collection was nominal, claimed the officer. KMC has started collecting land-property tax from ward Nos. 2, 5 and 20 as a pilot project to launch the programme in full swing.

On the other hand, the Ward No. 1 chairman Yogendra Kumar Shrestha said that the bills had enough information about the property and the reasons why the citizens should pay the tax, there were some mistakes in the specification which needs immediate correction.

"The collection of the land-property tax will not be difficult as the revenue will be used in the local development of the ward," said Shrestha.

Documentaries to be kept in national archive

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KATHMANDU, Nov 22 – General Madan Shamsher Rana shot films on modern 16mm color Kodak camera in the early 40s and 50s when most of the people use to rely on the traditional technology.

But it was his personal passion that prompted him to take pictures. He was the one who is believed to have shot the wedding ceremony of King Mahendra.

Well-known Swiss geologist Tony Hagen’s films were one of those records, which had documented modern Nepali images on celluloid. Hagen is said to have travelled 14,000 km surveying and photographing Nepal with a 16mm camera.

Apart from these few records, the documentary films in Nepal have never been recorded. This was revealed by two researchers today at a function to discuss the development of documentary filmmaking in Nepal. The workshop was organised by Nepal Forum for Environmental Journalists.

Journalists Binod Bhattarai and Mohan Mainali were doing a research on the history of documentaries in the country but they could not find any proper record or any archive. Only a single book, written by Laxminath Sharma, gives some details on the filmmaking.

"It was a thankless past, we could not get hold of anything to work out on," said Bhattarai. According to Bhattarai and Mainali, organized filmmaking in Nepal began with the establishment of Royal Nepal Film Corporation in 1971. The corporation then had produced 13 documentaries in its first ten years of establishment.

The Ministry of Information and Communication has about 1300 to 1400 cans gathering dust in library shelves and no one has the idea of the content, said Bhattarai. Nepal Film Board has been trying to salvage some of the reels lying there in the Ministry has been unsuccessful so far and has not been able to take over the ownership.

Bhattarai said that the early filmmakers lacked technical and human resources needed for filming and managing the logistics. "Even the technicians and the equipment had to be bought in either from Kolkata or Mumbai." But with an increase in number of NGOs and other development activities, documentary has taken a major leap in the 1990s, as majority of them need promotional video for their publicity.

Now, when the documentary revolution seem to have begun, the screening of these documentaries remain a problem. A team of filmmakers today opined that Nepal Television (NTV) does not have a slot for airing good documentaries.

If films shown in Film South Asia can be projected in NTV, people will know what is a documentary, said Mainali. "But sadly," he said, "Nepal is the only country where the producer has to pay to broadcast their films."

Television producer Bhusan Dahal said that the psychological threat of censorship has deviated many television creators to join the bandwagon of informal television, where the material put on air becomes trash and not included on the archival rack. "The universality required for production and broadcast of documentaries are still lowest in Nepal," he said.

Well-known filmmaker Deependra Gauchan said, "Documentation is undervalued and not given due respect in Nepal and it’s high time now for us to have a national archive to properly store the documentaries."

With dozens of documentary filmmakers complaining about proper documentation of their works, a sigh of relief came at the same function when Yadav Kharel, chairman of the Nepal Film Development Board, informed that the board is developing a national archive with the support of UNESCO.

Maoists reportedly undergo training in Dolakha

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JIRI, Nov 22 - Hundreds of Maoist rebels are reportedly taking vigorous training at a remote northeastern part of the Dolakha district at an altitude of 4000 meters.

A day after chairman of the Communist Party of Nepal (Maoist) issuing a statement ruled out the significance of four-month-old ceasefire and before the statement came, the Maoist rebels moved into the harsh Himalayan area to conduct the training.

According to the locals, the Maoists have gone towards the Himalayan base with weapons and bags overloaded with goods.

"We thought that the Maoists were going there to hold a programme but came to know only latter that they had gone there for training", said an individual who had just returned after seeing their camps. Sources said that the reason for the Maoists to choose the high altitude area is to get acquainted with the difficult situation and learn the techniques of making weapons and explosives.

It is also believed that the Maoists can easily coordinate their activity in the eastern region from this area.

Even shepherds were surprised to know that they chose such an area, which is only accessible during summer. "The area, however, has a big flat area that can accommodate hundreds of people and the Maoists must have thus chosen the place", said one of the shepherds.

The sympathizers of the Maoists in Jiri are reportedly supplying ration to the Maoist guerrillas undergoing training at the high-altitude land.

Prior to moving towards the Himalayan base, the Maoists had purchased a number of pressure cookers, pipes and castic soda to make explosives.

Swiss national shares the plight of poor villagers

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KATHMANDU, Nov 22 - Giving continuation to his humanitarian help that began in 1995, a Swiss national recently distributed smokeless stoves to the poor of Jhari village in the Mugu district.

He also distributed blankets and clothes to the people of two villages in Jumla district recently.

Marc Heritier of Switzerland recently returned from Jhari village of Mugu, a three-day walk away from the Jumla airport, and Bata and Talichaur villages of Jumla after distributing 93 smokeless stoves and 186 blankets plus 500 kilograms of clothes imported from Switzerland.

Thirty-seven years old Heritier have been supporting the poor villagers in Ramechhap and Kavre where he helped construct school-building and drinking water supply projects.

His recent visits to the villages in Mugu and Jumla prompted him to distribute these smokeless stoves, worth about 8,700 Swiss Franks, as he found out that the villagers there have been affected by various respiratory problems caused by smoke from traditional burning stove called Agena. The stove, which costs about Rs 5,000, is said to minimize the use of firewood and save people from smoke-borne diseases.

"I chose this project to give relief to the villagers from respiratory problems," Heritier told The Kathmandu Post.

Many people in these remote villages succumb to respiratory diseases every year and the filthy smoke from household cooking is considered to be one of the main causes of these problems.

"These projects have proven to be a big success and I am confident that many others may follow suit in the years to come," he said.

An employee at the United Banks of Switzerland, one of the world’s largest banks, Heritier has already completed similar projects in Bata and Micha villages of Jumla. He distributed smokeless stoves to 90 families in Bata village in 1998 and to 80 poor families of Micha in 1999.

He has also financed necessary operations in Kathmandu for the benefit of children coming here for treatment from remote places of Nepal, including distribution of medicines, clothes, shoes, blankets and stationary.

Heritier considers all these humanitarian services not more than the "duty of God." "It is my duty assigned to me by God to help the poor," he says. "I am happy to present myself for the help of the poor." One thing that struck him is the working style of national and international non-governmental organisations. "Where are these INGOs and NGOs working in Nepal for and for whom?" questions Heritier.

"They are not working for the welfare of the poor. Nor they have reached the places where there is no government and administration."

Heritier hopes to come back to Nepal in future to help other humanitarian projects and share the plight of the poor living in remote parts of Nepal.

Abducted policeman’s whereabouts unknown

GAIGHAT, Nov 22 (PR) - The whereabouts of police sub-inspector who was abducted a week ago by the Khumbuwan Liberation Front is still unknown even after the demanded amount of cash was handed over to them for his release.

According to family members of Bangara, Khumbuwan had sent a letter to his wife the next day demanding a cash of Rs 60,000 in order to release Bangara. In the letter they demanded to hand over the cash to Ambika Prasad Lamsal, chairman of Diyale VDC.

According to Jagat Bangara, chairman of Khotang VDC, the Khumbuwan Liberation Front has already taken the amount and now they want the government to release two of their cadres held in Khotang police office to release Bangara. "We informed them that we are not in a position to fulfil their latest demand and since then they have not come to contact", said Bangara’s wife.

According to the Local Administration,however, massive search has been launched to find Bangara.

Police Sub-inspector Dambar Prasad Bangara was abducted on November 13 by the Khumbuwan Liberation Front from Chisapani Bazaar of Khotang district in broad daylight and taken to unknown place.