Recent public criticism against the government’s decision to grant Rs. 20 million to the Maoist mountaineering team named “Lumbini-Sagarmatha Peace Journey” flooded the social networking and blogging sites. User- generated contents, most of them venting anger and expressing discontent against the government decision, continuously dominated social media sites such as Facebook and Twitter in Nepal.
While talking about ‘sincerity in writing’ one must mention about the example of the infamous intellectual fraud that was revealed in New York City, and is known as the Jayson Blair scandal. This picture (on the left) of a young man printed in News Week, the second –largest magazine of the United States, belongs to Blair who dragged the popular international newspaper The New York Times into a shameful news fabrication and plagiarism scandal which eventually forced Howell Raines, the Times' executive editor to apologize for the lapses in journalistic integrity.
I was walking hurriedly in Jawalakhel the other day, my eyes wandering to locate an office where I had a meeting, when my attention was briefly drawn to the Headquarters of British Gurkhas Nepal (BGN). The place looked clean, organised, and seemed to command importance like any other diplomatic missions, offices of bilateral and multi-lateral donor agencies and international NGOs in the cluttered huddle of concrete houses and buildings in the Kathmandu Valley. Surrounded by high walls topped with metal railings and CCTVs, a big iron gate serving as the entrance, only part of the main building could be seen from outside.
As Nepal yet again reel under shortage of fuel and cooking gas despite repeated assurances of the government to ease supply of essential commodities, an unknown artist recently drew this candid graffiti (picture posted below) on the tarmac of a busy Thamel street in Kathmandu to portray his desperation and anguish, and obviously that of many people living in the city .
It was 16 years back when Nepal Communist Party (Maoist) waged war from Rolpa, a district of mid west Nepal, to overthrow the system which it termed as the ‘old regime’ and capture the power. Holeri, a small marketplace of the hilly district, went through a nightmare for years since the Maoists launched their ‘people’s war’ introducing this remote area as the origin of the war.
China is a nation of great significance. Since 2010, it ranks as the world’s second largest economy after the United States. It has been the world's fastest growing major economy with consistent growth rates of around 10 percent over the past 30 years. It now stands for thriving large markets, growing military strength, and economic potential and influence in international affairs. It is also most often cited as having the ability to influence future world politics and reach the status of superpower in the 21st century.
Top politicos of Nepal sound these days highly optimistic in their expression on Peace Process (PP). Prime Minister Dr. Baburam Bhattarai pledged publicly at a Chhath-Tihar-Bakr-Id- get together in Janakpur "the first draft of the Constitution (C) will be made public by November 30, 2011," the last day of the present extension of the Constituent Assembly. He believes that political parties would finalize, by then, the much awaited PP pact.
Elusive Tigers and Mystic Mountains – A Photographic Journey
By Anand Gurung
Sunday, 09 October 2011 16:30
If big family get-together, large meals, drinking, gambling and merrymaking becomes much too overbearing during this festive season, opt for first class travel with Tiger Mountain Group into the deep jungles of Chitwan and beautiful surroundings of Pokhara.
Nepalis have over the years learnt not to expect much from the leaders including Prime Minister. They have bitter experience of how their high anticipation got snubbed by the politicos in power in recent times.
