The fun is yet to begin….
The Nepalese population would love to recall the tenure of Prime Minister
Girija Prasad Koirala in government for so many seen and unseen reasons. In fact as and
when he has assumed the nation’s Premiership, a sort of mayhem has found everytime
its place in the national politics. It is his tenure that has failed to deliver goods to
the people. Instead his government and some of his chums in the government have every time
been scathingly criticised for acts of corruption and that too going every time unpunished
much to the displeasure of the common men including those congress men who were
deliberately debarred from enetering in to the establishment considering them to be the
men from the other rival camp led by Deuba or even K.P.
Koirala’s government once upon a time housed three ministers who had
been declared number one corrupts not only by the ordinary population but even by his own
top hat colleagues including Bhattarai. This (in) famous trio comprised of Khum Bahadur,
Govind Raj Joshi and Bijaya Kumar Gachhedar. There had been one abbreviation in use then
which had nothing to do with the former intelligence agency of the now collapsed USSR. KGB
was the abbreviation which took care of the names in Koirala’s cabinet. These famous
personalities supposedly were close to the very hearts of the Prime Minister. Some even
said then that it is this trio which in effect guides Koirala and forces modestly to toe
their lines on domestic and international affairs.
As the luck would have it, one better name was added to this troika’s
abbreviation. However, it was decided by a number of media men to put the name of the new
entrant first. Hence the letter A was added to the already renowned KGB. The full form it
later took was AKGB. The letter A stood for, we were told, for Arjun Narsingh K.C.
However, what was clear to all the media men and the local population was that these
perosnalities were never caught red handed for committing foul acts as per the allegations
yet the intellectuals suspected their highhandedness in nation’s domestic politics
and thereby amassing wealth in the meantime. I for one believe still that unless proved
guilty by the competent court, no one should be declared corrupt or whatsoever. As a media
man, I too wrote some stories against them, but I’m still confused whether these
politicians were really a corrupt ones and accumulated astronomical amount of wealth which
could last for generations and generations to come in their private families.
I do not believe that they were corrupt as was given to understand. However,
what is for sure is that these men apparently look more handsome, wealthy and arrogant
these days as compared to what they were in effect before 1990 April. Some even said that
one towering congress leader who had no money to stitch his "’sleeper"-an
open footwear- prior to 1990 owns five posh five storied buildings in the Kingdom. What
was surprising for me when I learnt that the same congress man who asked five rupees from
his close friend for stitching the sleeper is yet to refund the money back to the one who
tentatively saved his prestige then.
Coming back to the real point, the Royal Nepal Airlines is the hardest hit of
Girija regime. The RNA perhaps trembles out of fear as and when Girija comes to power. The
previous Dhamija scandal and the current one with Lauda Air. As is the practice, some one
from the RNA is made scapegoat as and when such scandals of grave dimension occur.
However, no body so far has proved that Girija Koirala is the culprit. Here again he
enjoys benefit of doubt. Yet, if Hari Bhakta Shrestha is penalised and properly
interrogated perhaps he would give some clues as to who were the beneficiaries from this
deal. Let us wait till Shrestha is interrogated by Commission for the abuse of authority.
The fun is yet to begin. |
