Women’s Greater Participation

Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba has said that a national women’s commission is essential because of the very fact that the development of women is a part and parcel of overall national development. He said this at the inaugural function of the workshop on "National Women’s Commission: The Need of the Day", the other day. The formation of such a commission is a must in the present times when the participation of women in every sector can alone see a prosperous nation emerging. Here what is being hinted is that the rural women too must be able to come to the decision making level in a big way. This is all the more a point of concern that though more than half of the country’s population consists of women they are deprived in every aspect of life. If one gleans through the contributions that they make to the household and the society they are very much underprivileged. In education or availing health services, the situation is quite miserable. As most of the people live in the villages the death rate is very high. For example, for every 100,000 the maternal mortality death is 1,500 while that for South Asia as a whole is 567. This is enough to suggest that the lot of women has not greatly improved despite the regular priority of the government. There are many NGOs and INGOs involved in working for women but on the whole the progress is not what it should be.

Poverty, illiteracy and malnutrition are the major stumbling blocks for creating a bright horizon for women. Though, in recent times, there have been achievements in the form of the empowerment of women and the realization that without their contribution nothing can be achieved. In this sense the necessary preparations being made to constitute a women’s commission needs special mention. It is high time that men and women work on the same footing and at par. There is no reason to be conservative when all that means women are deprived of their rights. The Constitution of the Kingdom of Nepal-1990 guarantees equal rights to all but the necessity is to translate them into real life. It is the duty of all to work unitedly, without discrimination of any sort, so that women will be able to contribute to their fullest capacity.

Replicate It

THE government, according to a news report, has decided to relocate 10 rhinos from the Royal Chitwan National Park to the Royal Bardiya National Park on March 10 this year. Ever since the government, with cooperation from various international organisations working in the field of wildlife conservation, mobilized its scarce resources to protect the fasting dwindling herds of rhinos within the nation’s borders by setting aside wildlife preserves, these animals have made an astounding come-back. So much so that right now the Royal Chitwan National Park, despite being one of the nation’s largest wildlife preserves, is reported to overcrowded with rhinos. At present, out of the nation’s total 617 rhinos, if 544 rhinos are in the Royal Chitwan National Park alone, then 67 are in the Royal Bardiya National Park and only one in the Shuklaphanta Wildlife Reserve. What all this shows is that the Royal Chitwan National Park is definitely teeming with rhinos. Whenever there is overcrowding in a wildlife reserve, the protected animals whose populations are fast outstripping their habitats’ carrying capacities invariably tend to forage out from their protected areas in search of food, water and fodder. Since most of these wildlife reserves are surrounded by human settlements, as and when these wild animals start to compete with the domesticated animals for scarce food, water and fodder outside their protected preserves, unwanted incidents could take place. Similarly, overcrowding of any animal species within the limited confines of a wildlife reserve could prove to be detrimental to their very survival as a species in the long run. For, when rare animal diseases suddenly erupt, the chances of entire rhino herds succumbing to these deadly maladies will always be there. Moreover, overcrowding could lead to in-breeding among the rhino herds. It could be for these reasons that the government, with World Wildlife Fund’s assistance, has been translocating rhinos from the Royal Chitwan National Park to the jungles of Royal Bardiya National Park from time to time.

Nepal, as far as protecting these endangered one-horned pachyderms for posterity is concerned, has earned many international accolades, thanks to its successful wildlife protection and conservation plans, policies and programmes. What definitely remains now is for the concerned authorities to replicate the nation’s one-horned rhino protection success story in other wildlife preserves so that other endangered wild animals’ populations too could reach sustainable levels.