Resolution Of The Crisis
Unity Under Monarchy

By Chiranjibi Paudyal

UNITY of all the major political parties and the civil society under the constitutional monarchy and strengthening multi party democracy is the only way out to resolve the present crisis being faced by the country. Monarchy is the only respected and stable institution of the Kingdom which can unite all the political parties, institutions and the people of various ethnic communities in a single knot of national unity for the welfare of the people and the country.

People's Faith

The major political parties should unitedly co-operate with the King to resolve the present crisis of the country unleashed by the Maoist insurgency and the intra-party struggle for power. Law and order situation has worsened the peaceful land of the birth place of Lord Buddha, the apostle of peace is under the state of violence and murder. Thousands of people have become the victim of unnecessary struggle. Murder and violence have become the common news in the peaceful country. Such situation could not have occurred if the political parties had seriously thought of the state affairs in the past. It is not necessary to explain what role the political parties played during last 12 years of democracy. The people understand it very clearly that their role was diminished even during the democratic era. Despite the lack of far sightedness of the leaders, people have faith in democracy and there is no alternative to democracy in the 21st century. This is the age of democracy and the problems could be resolved through democratic system. Sloganeering just saying "nascent democracy' and 'safeguarding democracy" does not help resolve the problem. There is the need to translate the democratic culture, values and norms in the every day life of the people especially it is applicable to the political leaders who remained in power during the last 12 years. They should reform their character, way of life and try to understand the reality of democracy and how democratic system is functioning in the democratic countries. It is quite shameful to point their finger at others without improving their own character and behaviour. The activities of not all but some leaders of the major political parties remind that democracy is not for the people, by the people and of the people but for the leaders, by the leaders and of the leaders.

Democratic culture could not be developed because the political parties did not pay attention to the ability and competency of the people but the people of "slave and opportunist mentality" got the opportunity in the state affairs. Corruption and bad governance sublimed everywhere. Keeping in view the shortcoming and misdeeds of the past the political parties and the civil society all should unitedly co-operate with the monarch to resolve the present crisis of the country and show their maturity and democratic culture.

His Majesty King Gyanendra Bir Bikram Shah Dev has time and again said that he is fully committed to multi party democracy and constitutional monarchy, therefore there is no need to suspect in the good intention of the King. It is not necessary to remind the situation of the country before October 4, 2002. Was it democratic to dissolve the elected parliament and try to stick in power without holding the election ? Who recommended the King to dissolve the parliament and declare mid term polls ? Why were the major political parties afraid of the election and recommended the King
to postpone the election indefinitely ? If there was democratic culture and a little bit a feeling of democracy then such incident would not have occurred in the country. Everything is crystal clear and the people understand that there is no need to give strong slogan in favour of democracy.
The Monarch is saying that he is committed to democracy; the people are saying that they support democracy then why there should be hue and cry about safeguarding democracy. Democracy is a way of life, it is culture and it should be reflected in our daily life. Democracy is not a slogan but it should be reflected in the working style and every day life of everyone.

Difficult

The country is in a difficult situation. A large number of people are compelled to live under the condition of absolute poverty. They are deprived of basic needs. Murder and violence has affected every sector. The sorrow and grief of the people living in the difficult circumstances cannot be expressed in words. The bad governance and corruption has engulfed the image of the country into the mire. Our glorious past has disappeared in the pages of history. In such a terrible and heart rending situation of the country, if we indulge in fighting and accusing each other forgetting our responsibility, we will only invite disaster. All the political parties, civil society and the people of all sectors and ethnic community have to unitedly pledge to resolve the problem of the country to fulfill our dream of prosperous Nepal. Let's all unite and work making the monarchy a meeting point of all the people.

Utility Of Solar Energy

By Chiran Thapa

IN a remote village in Bihar, a state of India tribals draw water using solar pumps. Near Bangalore, a railway station is operated with solar cells. Large hotels and industries in cities use solar energy to heat water and so on.

Commercial Use

In general, solar energy can be put to a variety of uses- heating water, cooking, drying crops, heating houses, mechanical and electrical power production etc. Of all the commercial uses of solar energy, such as heating water, cooking, drying etc. heating water is the only one that is economically viable. Solar water heaters are nowadays widely used in Nepal. It has wide applications in large establishment like hotels, hostels, homes, hospitals, and industries such as textiles, paper and food processing and even swimming pools.

Of the three main solar energy conversion processes, thermal conversion (converting into heat) and biomass conversion seem to be on way to making a dent whereas conversion of solar energy directly into electricity, although technologically feasible, has still to go a long way to be economically viable.
Solar heaters, simple to construct, need almost no running and maintenance cost and are competitive with electrical water heaters. To heat water with solar energy, we need to trap and collect that energy and convert it into heat. Many sophisticated systems can be built on this and much pioneering work had been done in the USA, UK Australia, S. Africa and India. Work on solar water heaters had been in progress for nearly a century and over 30,000 had been installed in the US by 1950. Rapid technical advances in the last 50 years have made solar water heaters viable and the obvious benefits can no longer be overlooked where the climate is ideal particularly when the energy shortage is getting acute.
A simple solar heater is based on a box with flat-metallic plate collectors with tubes or pipe on them. which absorb the radiation and heat water or any fluid flowing through the tubes. The plate is polished or painted black to increase heat absorption and the box insulated to reduce heat loss. A transparent glass, which helps retain heat by reducing heat losses, usually covers it. The glass cover lets in light radiations but does not allow the reflected (re-radiated) radiations to escape from the box. Trapping the radiations inside, it causes Green-house effect.

Cooking by the sun, is a simple technology, which has received much attention, and much effort has been made to develop a solar cooker. They are not yet popular and are not used these days because of its major drawbacks such as it cannot cook food on cloudy day or at night takes long time to cook, can cook only few dishes and so on. If these problems could be tackled, it could come to be widely used. If they are properly designed and introduced, they represent a much-needed appropriate technology for millions of people around the world.

The best-known cooker is the Wisconsin cooker developed at the solar energy laboratory at the University of Wisconsin, USA. It used a 1.2m dia. reflector with an aluminium mylar polyster film, which gave an output of 400-500 watts at a solar radiation intensity of 1 kilowatt falling on the reflector. A typical box cooker is a double-walled insulated box and the inside of the box is blackened to increase heat absorption. The cooking vessel is kept inside the box and a reflector (silvered mirror) is hinged to one side of the box and fitted into the lid.

At Rajahmundry in Andhra Pradesh, India tobacco is cured using solar energy. In a farm near Ladowal near Ludhiana, large solar drier is used to dry grains. Solar driers are very much related with solar water heaters and cookers; the concept is almost same rather there are slight changes in the instrument.

Advantage

In the natural convection or cabinet solar driers, the grains or substenace, which are to be dried, receive solar energy directly and air is circulated by natural convection. The construction of a solar drier is very simple. It is an insulated box covered with a transparent glass and the interior surface blackened. Small holes are drilled through the base and a small chimney at the top to induce airflow. The substances to be dried are placed on drying trays. As solar energy enters the box, the substance and its interior absorb it. The temperature of the drier rises and leaves from the chimney and fresh
air enters through the holes at base. The air temperature of the drier rises sufficiently high from 20-40 degree centigrade above ambient, depending on the solar intensity. Though drying process is rather slow and is not suitable for large scale drying, the advantage is that it does not need any other source of energy, ie. electrical or mechanical. Simple in design, these driers can be fabricated easily by village artisans.

The Priestly Love Drama

By Jagadish Pokhrel

Scene 1:

A PRIEST in his fifties and a young girl in her twenties run into each other.

"Oops, sorry! But wasn't that interesting," says the priest. Perhaps the threshold of something being interesting is low for the priest.

The girl blushes a bit and gazes at him in some kind of awe, and wonderment, with her head at an angle to the ground when part of her flowing hair falls from a side. She knows the priest as a respected figure in the tranquil and sparsely populated settlement where everyone knows everyone else.

"In this village of eastern Nepal, running into each other happens only during the weekly marts," one Adhikari, who has seen the encounter between the two, relates the story to a journalist. Nothing big, that's no news-just a little unusual and awkward.

Scene 2:

The priest is coming home from the Shivalaya temple. During the last many decades, he went there every morning, offered his worship and gave prasad to the devotees who came to visit. He had been an eloquent and learned man who attempted to inculcate in everybody a sense of love, compassion, gentleness and altruism through his preachings and he could draw on from the Gita to the Bible.
The girl had been there once or twice and had heard from him the lofty ideals of loyalty and fidelity. She was amazed as the priest dropped in at her home.

"Compassion, altruism, gentleness and love, these are very important," he said as he found out she was alone. "Will you offer me a cup of tea?"

The girl brought tea and Adhikari, during his leisurely walk on the road, overheard the priest and the girl talking over tea.

Words have multiple meanings - Adhikari is relating this to the journalist. "What would his teaching mean in the context of a home where a dumb girl is the listener?"

Well, no news as such. Except for a sleazy suspicion that is creeping in to Adhikari's mind, the words multiplying their meanings, wriggling and twisting in his head.

Scene 3:

As Adhikari makes it a habit to linger on around the dumb girl's house, which the priest does not know at all, talking over tea has been a repetitious act.

"Did you like touching me, the worldly experience?" the girl's gestures at the priest are interpreted by Adhikari.

"I think yes," the priest says, then he says 'maybe,' then 'no' and that that was not what he meant really." Then they are not seen.

What Adhikari, keeping a close tab from a relatively shorter distance, believes he heard was the wriggling and twisting sounds.

They were drinking and loving. Adhikari relates it to journalist, who still does not see this is news, and says he was even sure that the girl was given sixty rupees as handout every time he visited.

Conclusion:

Pathari Police Post acts upon the complaints made by the villagers, who hushed and whispered about the rumour or the reality about the affair for quite a while, that there was some illicit relation between the two. The health check-up on the girl shows she is six-month-pregnant. The priest is forced to accept the girl as his wife.

The Moral: Sex makes news. If it is manifested in an innocent girl's pregnancy, it is more newsworthy. A known man is involved, it is all the more worthwhile. One Bhandari priest is the perpetrator, it makes it irresistible. Who bothers when the seeds of news are sown, it is only when they germinate, newspapers carry it.