Democracy Day

THE nation is celebrating the Tribhuvan Jayanti and 53rd Democracy Day today with various programmes to pay tributes to His late Majesty King Tribhuvan for his historic contribution to democracy, people and the nation. History is witness that His late Majesty King Tribhuvan even sacrificed the throne to join the people's movement for the establishment of multi-party democracy in the country in 1951. The collective and cooperative movement of the King and the people overthrew the century-old family oligarchy of the Ranas and ushered in a new era of democracy in which people became masters of their destiny. This is the historic relation between the Monarchy and the people, which has always been instrumental in solving nation's problem. Since then, we have celebrated the Democracy Day every year to express our commitment to uphold the spirit and values of democracy and work together for the larger interest and development of the nation. The ideals and values of democracy are more relevant today as the nation is passing through a most difficult phase of history. Society has been divided and unnecessary conflicts and violence have caused an enormous loss to the nation. This is by no means compatible to the spirit of democratic system and culture. In a democracy, differences of opinions and views are common. But such differences need to be resolved peacefully through dialogue and negotiation. The beauty of democracy is it accommodates conflict and allows compromise. But the conflicts must not turn into violence. At the same time, the fate of democracy depends upon the behaviour of political parties and their leaders. Those who aspire for democracy also need to demonstrate genuine democratic culture. Democracy is not merely a political system but a way of life, which politicians and leaders must demonstrate through their conduct and commitment. Democracy is the people's polity and it works for the best interest of the nation. Political parties, thus, need to rise above their partisan interest and concentrate their strength and efforts for the development of the country. However, that has been hardly seen over the last couple of years. The ultimate goal of political parties and politicians, it seems, is to grab power by hook or by crook. This attitude was largely responsible for the problems the country is facing at present. Now it is high time that all of us need to work together for the nation and the people in a true spirit of democracy. This should be the message of the 53rd Democracy Day.

School Of Economics

THE Central Department of Economics of the Tribhuvan University, as per a news item carried by this daily the other day, is setting up a School of Economics in the next two years based on the model of the London School of Economics (LSE) and a similar institution, Delhi School of Economics in India. Towards this end, advanced teaching, learning and research methodologies used in the London School of Economics and the Delhi School of Economics are to be incorporated in the yet-to-be-born institution's syllabus. That the Tribhuvan University (TU) has finally decided to upgrade its Central Department of Economics by incorporating the teaching, learning and research methodologies used in the London School of Economics and the Delhi School of Economics should be sounding as sweet music to the ears of all professors, researchers and students of economics at home. And the reason for this should be by now obvious to all. For, this century is the century of global trade-which, in turn, is increasingly being driven by market forces that not only seem to be getting more and more complex but, much to the chagrin of many economists, also increasingly becoming unpredictable too. It could be due to this reason that the world in general and the trading nations in particular is having to witness wild gyrations in trading activities that, on their part, never fail to unleash bull and bear runs in stock markets big or small all over the world. Practitioners and students of economics, be they of Nepal or elsewhere, very much loathe to see their predictions, if not forecasts, go haywire. But then, economics as a professional pursuit, if not as an academic discipline, is no more as simple as it used to be, say, three decades ago. Nor, for that matter, is it lumped purely in the realm of humanities. To assume so is akin to being obsolete in both approach to knowledge and practice. As academia becomes more and more inter-disciplinary due to the complexities of the modern world, it is but natural that economics as a traditional discipline in Nepal too should keep up with the changing reality. That is what the LSE and other schools fashioned in that style makes them distinctive-and the cynosure of the practitioners and learners of economics. Now that TU is trying to follow suit, it should work harder in the days ahead to make its Economics Department relevant to our needs and context.