Dr. Hark Gurung’s prescription!

We have valid grounds to be in agreement with Dr. Harka Gurung, one of the best planners this country have had ever, when he says that it is the rural communities that have been keeping the towns alive and that the villages and the towns were complementary to each other and in the absence of a close economic nexus in between the two, the existence of the other is simply impossible. He also makes it clear is that a village is a village until its basic infrastructures are not developed or else it would have been a township instead. He in the same mood exhibits his discontentment over the idea of differentiating in between the two, the towns and the villages. Instead of making such humiliating distinctions, Dr. Gurung would wish the government approached the villages in the remote areas, which lacked the very basics that persons residing in a village demand. His idea is that the government must initiate actions that begins with a village that is denied with health, transport, education, potable water and the likes. In this connection he also draws the attention of the international donor community to act or pour in their donations in projects that directly affect the livelihood of the men residing in the villages. Dr. Gurung sees no injury if the donor community itself comes into close contact with the villages that need their support. It is also remarkable that Dr. Gurung emphasizes the need to act in a manner that provides priority to the development of the villages than going into what he calls overall development of the area concerned. It is not for nothing that this globally acclaimed planner of this country urges the establishment and the planners seated in Singh Durbar to seriously take stock of the problems and the shortcomings which apparently hit the country’s ninth-plan hard. He proposes the government and the donor community to hold ample discourse on how to proceed with the development efforts in the face of the ongoing conflict like situation. He then suggests that after such a dialogue in between the State and the donors, the line ministries which are directly related with the development projects must coordinate each other for the speedy functioning which is what is lacking in the country. Last but not the least, academician Gurung then demands the state to initiate dialogues with those who are made the target in the donor driven projects. In an implied manner, Dr. Gurung suggests the establishment to go to the villages and ask the people living there as to what were their priorities in the first place and then act accordingly.

Certainly, if the villages were to develop, the responsibilities have got to be delegated to the local levels who perhaps know better what their priorities were and how to proceed with the development efforts which benefited them ultimately.

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