Floating brilliant ideas does not involve cost!

Floating of ideas that benefit people is very easy in Nepal. This is what is being done day-in-day-out by our revered politicians. It is said that one has not to pay any cost while floating ideas and hence most of the informed citizenry, mostly the leaders, go on floating ideas for they know that they were not paying for that at any cost. Some even say that in Nepal we have a set of intellectuals who have made it a point to float ideas as and when they are invited for a talk program or to attend a seminar. After all the 1990 constitution does not bar any Nepali citizen from floating ideas. So what's wrong in floating ideas? I do not think there should be any problem to any one.

If one were to collect the ideas that have been floated already all along these thirteen "golden" democratic years, it should have been in tonnes and tonnes and the problem would then have been for its storage. Perhaps keeping this serious problem of storage in mind, the ideas are floated albeit but not stored. Or else the government would have to construct a bid storehouse for its safe and sound storage. Some ministers floated the idea of constructing a warehouse but then the clever prime minister outrightly rejected the idea on grounds that if it were constructed it would involve government funds and hence had the hundred percent probability of the money thus disbursed on that count being pocketed by the men involved in the said project. However, he could not stick longer to his commitment for fear of being maneuvered by his own colleagues.

The greater chunk as usual generally goes into the pockets of the minister. However, this should not mean that only the minister or the junior minister were its sole beneficiaries. The fact is that the recipients of the loot begins from the moment some one is told to prepare the draft of the concept itself. The next recipient is the one who approves the paper. The third one is the one seated in the ministry who pushes the matter for its ministerial decision. The minister then whispers into the ears of his PA to keep an eye into the whole affair and also tells him to watch who else exhibit their keen interest in the said project.

Then comes the role of the bureaucrats. These generally cunning and shrewd lots distort the matter at the very start. And this they do with proper finesse. The minister then is forced to listen to the bureaucratic views which means that the latter too wished its due share.

In the process some one at the ministry informs the office of the prime minister that one case of bungling was in the offing. Usually the PA to the Premier receives the phone who then investigates the details and finally manages his share in the said loot. The Premier not necessarily know his PA's adventure.

After the required approval, the ministry prefers to invite those construction companies who offer best commission. In the process, a fierce battle takes place but the lay men do not know about that. Finally the project is awarded to one who is ready to satisfy the pockets of all those who were involved in the "nation building" scheme.

Exploiting the lust for money by the intermediaries, the man who has received the award begins maneuvering. The maneuvering could include in the utilization of low quality sand; small gauge iron rods; low quality Portland cement and the likes. The construction works with all these low-grade materials begin in the evening so that no body could complain about that.

In the mean time what the contractor of the project does is that he pushes an application in the name of the minister that due to international factors which were beyond his control he be allowed to increase the total amount by twenty percent. This he does, we are told, at the instructions of the bigwigs. In doing so the idea is to offer ten percent from the increased amount to the minister and his associates and the rest goes to the man who is the contractor of the project.

For this purpose, the minister takes himself extra pains and convinces the cabinet that the poor contractor is talking sense when he demands that the money be increased.

The cabinet members smile from within but do not utter words for they too were the birds of the same feather. The cabinet approves the extra payment on "humanitarian grounds".

In the process, some media men begin taking notice of the whole affair. They smack foul and print that some thing fishy should be in the said project. The contractor reads the negative story and then telephones the chief editor to see him in person. This is called "damage control". The media man upon return from the meeting rushes to a restaurant. Next week there appears in his own newspaper a "corrigendum" stating that his own reporter had misinformed regarding the construction works. At the end of the corrigendum the editor apologizes stating that "'we express our deep regret that our writing in so many ways hurt the sentiments of a nationalist contractor. The reporter thus has been sacked".

Finally, the building is inaugurated. Even at the inaugural ceremony, the concerned officers' bungle with the price involved in the snacks. The poor junior staffs some how or the other manage some extra snacks for their children only to be contracted by deadly diseases. The fact is that it is these junior staffs who carry the files from here to there for its sanctions or approvals but do not become a party to the loot.

The minister generally does not take such snacks for fear of being attacked by Typhoid or some other terrible diseases.

Within six months of the inaugural of the building, the contractor is again invited to do the needed patch-work / The process of "nation building task" thus continues.

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