Decentralised Development The Late King’s Vision

By Gandhi Raj Kafle

SOMETIMES it’s too hard to add the word ‘late’ for calling the name, which was respectfully spelt out for long in the life of a nation. How can the faith, which the people enjoyed to give some one highly honourable, crumble all of a sudden? That’s why even death sometimes becomes very unbelievable. The reason in the case of Nepal recently is that nobody even in his dream had ever thought of such a macabre ending of life of the highly revered personalities of this country. So, the countrymen in the beginning were seemingly firm not to believe this incident because they had the unshakable good wishes for long life of the then King. But, truth is truth, it makes every one helpless. The history of the nation has already received a mind-shocking wound and the tragedy of this unimaginable incident is that there has been no medicine available in the world to heal this painful injury of the Nepalese history. That’s why the people of this country with their heavy heart and tearful eyes are bound to add the word ‘late’ before the name, which they spelt out with deep sense of honour for so long.

So, it was quite natural for the Nepalese people to break into tears because their heart spontaneously reacted spilling all the innocent love, which they had been storing for the long and prosperous life of the monarch. And, in this course of sharp and innocent reaction, they continued to disbelieve their own ears too and all the printed words that spreaded the bitter information seemed only a delusion for them. In fact, the grief gripped the Nepalese citizens suddenly, the tears rolled down from their eyes automatically and the cloud of gloom overshadowed their face intensively. The people for the first time came to realise how harsh it was to feel the pain when truth begin to tell something unbelievable.

The very tragic case in which every one became sad is here. All the Nepalese people and all the friends of Nepal in the entire world remained deeply stunned and shocked in this incident. this, gigantic tragedy for the monarch loving people of the Kingdom of Nepal is the passing away of His Majesty King Birendra Bir Bikram Shah Dev, Her Majesty Queen Aishwarya Rajya Laxmi Devi Shah, His Majesty King Dipendra Bir Bikram Shah Dev, Prince Nirajan Bir Bikram Shah Dev, Princess Sruti Rajya Laxmi Devi Rana and other senior members of the then Royal Family in the incident that took place on the fateful Friday night of the first June of 2001 at the Narayanhiti Royal Palace.

But, the grim reality is that nobody can alter this truth. The living beings, who leave for the heavenly abode once, do not return back. His late Majesty King Birendra too does not came back. So, the extremely bitter truth, for which the Nepalese people are mustering courage to tolerate some unimaginable shock, at the crucial times of national mourning, too is an unalterable fact for all the grief-stricken citizens of this Himalayan Kingdom.

But, to console in this time of grief, the words of His late Majesty King Birendra are there. His wisdom to guide the nation, his pragmatic style to direct this country and his tireless efforts to help the people of this Kingdom prosper too are there. King Birendra is no more with the people today, but, to tell the truth, these things, which he has left for the country during his glorious reign will not simply be forgotten. Actually, the late King had both the vision and pragmatism to do good for the nation.

Late King Birendra was for balanced development of Nepal, for which he had divided the country into five development regions. This concept for accelerating the process of economic development in the country is praised by all. In fact, regional disparity in distribution of natural resources and the region to region gap in physical infrastructure are the unavoidable things to ponder seriously for the country’s development strategy. His late Majesty’s primary concern was to narrow this gap through the proper process of national investment in carefully chosen fields of production, for which every development region holds special offer to attract potential capital to maximize the benefit for the people.

Actually, if we think of Nepal’s economic development in terms of topographical variations, late King Birendra’s concept to resources mobilisation holds special significance. Nepal’s Himalayan region can attract thousands of mountain loving tourists of the world every year giving the country its much needed foreign currency sustainably. Similarly, hill region is fit for fruit farming and Terai of Nepal can give surplus food, which can be exported do correct the existing adverse balance of trade of the country.

Thus, three geographical regions and three apparent potential to tap in Nepal had been late King Birendra’s long term framework for economic development, which can’t be forgotten also in the days to come. Actually, man dies, it’s universal truth. In this vein, the bitter truth for all of us today is that King Birendra is no more with us. But, what philosophers believe firmly is that thoughts never die. Late King Birendra’s thoughts too will not die. So, the people in general and planners of the country in particular will not be derailed in the path of duty, for which His late Majesty has left many evergreen thoughts to remember for the good of the nation.

Where Reason Reigns, Superstition Recedes

By Gyan Rai

MUNESHWARI Devi Yadav, 75, of Mahottari district’s Itisarwa VDC, as per a news item carried by this daily (July 2, 2001), was manhandled by four persons and forced to eat feces after being branded as a witch.

The recent incident of manhandling a woman suspected of being a witch was, by no means, the very first in Nepal. Nor, for that matter, in any place throughout the world. There had been such cases earlier in Nepal as well as in some places of the world. Particularly in many poor and least-developed nations like Nepal where, needless to point out, there is a dearth of social consciousness and awareness among the people thereby forcing them to languish in darkness amidst numerous social taboos and malpractices.

Notwithstanding all this, witchcraft—and its antithesis, witch-hunt—can be said to be as old as human civilisation. A cursory glance through religious texts of the major religions will reveal that witchcraft and witch-hunt were prevalent in the respective societies where these major religions had flourished or made inroads centuries ago. So much to that in some religious heads and organisations used to organise pogroms to ferret out witches and warlocks from their societies. In more severe cases, they were burned at the stakes.

As far as witchcraft and its adherents are concerned, no one can clearly say when they made an advent on earth. Most probably witches—and their male counterparts, the warlocks—came into existence as and when the small and loose groups of homo sapiens started to coalesce or band together into bigger groups. And, from amongst these big groups, some woman—or a man—who had mastered the art (or science?) of reading the signs to forecast what the future holds for their groups was singled out because of her (or his) special quality. Or, better still, power.

For what is certain is that our ancestors were definitely awed and intimidated by the raw display of power by Mother Nature in the form of lightning, thunder, storm, tornado, flood, tide and even earthquake. Add to all this the yearly seasonal changes in their surroundings—which also induced the animals that they hunted for food to embark of mass migrations—then they had a potent recipe to believe in supernatural elements or beings.

As such, those amongst them who had the power of divination (or were smart enough to read and interpret the signs periodically displayed by Mother Nature) were obviously held in great awe and respect by the rest of their fellow beings. It could be for this reason that early chiefs of such bands of men and women either dabbled in witchcraft themselves or were given tacit support by such persons who, from time to time, extracted their "pound of flesh" from the chiefs in the form of sacrifices, be they human or animal. This, in turn, instilled fear in the rest—and which these witches and warlocks used to the hilt to consolidate their hold over both the chiefs and lay people alike. As societies progressed, these men or women with their special powers could have gradually assumed or carved for themselves exalted positions within their own groups. With their positions secured within such societies, the rest, as they say, is witchcraft at its best (or worst, depending on the practitioners).

But then, among all the animals, the humans are considered to be the most knowledgeable—and, through association, the most prone to jostle for position and power. The more so as it would be simply inconceivable that there would be only one such a warlock (and in rare occasions, a witch since the majority of the early societies were male-dominated bands of humans) within a group. Naturally, he would be having some followers, especially those who loathe, hate or have some scores to settle with the incumbent warlock.

This means that as and when another claimant to the reigning warlock’s position appears in the scene, there would be a test of power between the incumbent and the pretender. The test could include doing bizarre miracles (at least to the lay people). And, in a trial of magical power like this when everything is at stake for both the contestants, the winner will go on to lord over the group—and the loser will either lose his life or, in a group which is more lenient, be banished from the group with his own followers. It is this kind of "renegade" groups that go on to form their own cabals, with the vanquished warlocks (or witches) carrying eternal angst in their hearts against their chiefs or counterparts who had defeated them.

The advent of more organised religions—since all religions invariably started off as small cults in the very beginning—could have sounded the death knell of the witches or warlocks’ cabals in some societies. However, in those where such religions have yet to establish their footholds, the warlocks and witches still do play a benevolent or malevolent role. Also, in those societies where the people, inspite of professing the dominant religions’ tenets and injunctions, still cling to their ancient beliefs and practices.

But just as intellectuals all over the world are wont to aver by the sweat of their high brows that there is only a thin dividing line between a genius and a madman, so too the people of those societies that believe in warlocks and witches also swear that there is a very hazy dividing line between a good and bad warlock (or witch). It could be for this reason that even shamans (male or female, but who are known to minister to the spiritual and curative needs of their respective societies) are called "witch-doctors". In other words, the good warlocks and witches are called shamans whereas the evil ones are called....yes, warlocks and witches. And in a society where such differentiation is prevalent, there will be no dearth of unscrupulous persons who, just to settle some score, would not hesitate to brand someone as a witch or a warlock.

Hence, if such a practice is to be rooted out from the society once and for all, then it looks to reason to take the light of education to the doorsteps of society. For, where reason reigns, superstition recedes.

What’s & Why Of Child Delinquency

By Abhinawa Devkota

WHENEVER I try to think about the future of street children, it becomes a sort of nightmare for me. The busiest roads of Kathmandu are indeed the home to hundreds of street children. We find them unkempt with saggy dress playing or collecting rags or abusing somebody in a humorous way . The ‘civilised’ society calls them ‘Khates’. They appear to be spending their time merrily, but what about their future? Their future is surely not hidden from us. The saying ‘Morning Shows the Day’ well speaks of the future of these urchins. Their present reflects their future, which is surely a dark tunnel of crime.

The street children have become a great problem for some people living in Kathmandu because of their behavior of cheating, stealing and pick pocketing. But are they really to be blamed? To blame them without looking, into the reality would be doing injustice to them. A child would never, by choice, take to the streets unless forced to do so. The factors attributed to the increase in the number of street children are poverty and psychological distur-bance by their parents or stepparents.

Poverty has become the greatest challenge for our country. Almost, 40 per cent of the Nepalese are living below the poverty line. When poverty is predominant then it leads to famine and starvation, poverty stricken children are forced to work in hotels and restaurants. Children exposed to servitude run away from their homes and become street children. They take up the roles of thieves, servants, rickshaw pullers just for the sake of money and when they are ill treated by their masters they have only two options either to take to the streets or to die. The other perversions caused by poverty are deviance from education. The growing economic activities resulting in rapid development has led people to value money to a great degree than ever before and commercialisation of education is rampant.

The poor people are unable to educate themselves and a family without educated members has to live in poverty. This in turn has compelled children to work at young age or to become street children.

A child is often a victim of psychological trauma due to an alcoholic father or a stepparent. When a child is ill treated, battered and is not well fed then the individual gradually develops strong hatred towards his family. The person feels isolated from the family and eventually runs away from home to land up in the streets.

The afore-mentioned factors by and large motivate the child to become a vagabond. It is found that there are more than 5000 street children in Nepal while there are roughly 8000 NGOs and INGOs working for the street children. Some of them are working for the welfare of street children.

The growing number of street children has a resonance effect in the society. Many street children are exposed to crime such as drug addiction stealing and pickpocketing. Drug addic-tion is the most pertinent problem requiring urgent attention. Drugs like sleeping tablets were found to be used by the street children some years ago. But now they have been introduced to new methods of drug addiction. They put glue in a polythene bag and inhale it. Drug addiction leads street children to crimes. Once they resort to crime they tend to take crime as a means of survival. They are inspired to give continuity to it and as they grow up they could even start looting, murdering and stealing valuable things from houses. As time passes by they get totally indulged in crime and head towards the point of no return.

It is high time that the concerned authorities did something to rehabilitate the street children, as their number seems to be increasing rapidly. If the number is not contained then crime will go on increasing in an unabated manner.Welfare organi-sations are accommodating and nourishing the street children. The sad part of the story is that children make a U-turn and plunge back into the same world, from where we want to take them out.