WHY NEPAL MUSTN'T SAY NO TO NEW ZEALAND RESCUE TEAM?

After the deadliest earthquake hit Nepal last Saturday, Nepal has not just lost 5500 plus people but also its priceless historical sites and monuments enlisted in UNESCO heritage list. Since this is an extraordinary event, the entire world is reacting and many countries are sending their financial and human rescue aid to support Nepal. Undoubtedly, the government of Nepal is under absolute pressure as they are responsible to lead the rescue operations collaborating with foreign rescue support teams but if somebody from our government dare to make any discouraging and disrespectful statement to the support team coming from overseas, especially from New Zealand, they need to apologize immediately and understand the following realities.

• New Zealand Search and Rescue team is one of the best teams in the world as they have had a lot of experiences dealing with frequent earthquakes here in NZ, esp the big one in Christchurch in 2010.

• Since late Sir Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norge had summited Mount Everest for the first time in the world, our mutual bond is very unique, so the current government has no right to strand the NZ Search and Rescue team right before their departure

• I haven't found any record of Nepal making any genuine attempt to establish diplomatic and bilateral relationship with NZ and now when NZ government have come forward to building this relationship, Nepal mustn't lose this opportunity

• The current government of Nepal and all political parties have hurt the sentiments of entire Nepalese first by not giving us the promised new constitution in the last 5 years and now by demonstrating the extremely poor managerial standard in the entire rescue management and coordination department

• Narendra Modi and his cabinet have made multiple attempts and assurance that they won't leave any stone un-turned to help our people with whatever necessary but where is the convincing assurance and commitment from our government and our major politicians. Some of the Indian MPs are willing to offer their monthly pay to help the affected victims in Nepal but where is the willingness of our jumbo 601 members to help their people in need?

• The government must be ashamed of declaring the financial support of Rs 40,000 to the family who have lost their members in the disaster. $500 is not sufficient enough for a month's survival for a family at this stage. The government must have common sense before making such a shameful decision which has not just increased the pain of the victims but has again made every Nepalese negative about Nepali politics and politicians

• We are not just one of the poorest countries in the world but also corrupted one. Especially when the country is getting global attention in such a huge scale, the government must have been proud with so many helping hands coming in and must have led the management initiative with top notch efficiency but saying 'NO' to the 'increasing foreign rescue and support services' is absolute madness of our impotent government

• Affected people in rural years haven't even got food and water since the earthquake first hit on Saturday which vividly demands more support and rescue team. When this is the reality how can our government turn both blind and dumb at the same time?

          Lack of rescue, supplies and care

• Where are our media at the moment? What Nepali media, especially TVs are doing to some extent is OK but it's not enough, learn something from international media like CNN, Al Jazeera and mainly from Indian media and try to go outside Kathmandu and talk to victims, their families and the opinion leaders from the affected communities. Your regular old school cricket commentary style of reporting can't spread the voice or ordinary citizens suffering throughout the country. At this time, don't report about what the prime minister and president of Nepal feels, show the world how our people are feeling, suffering, uniting and collaborating to overcome the situation. Collaborate with foreign media to reach where the government hasn't

• International aid and support is pouring extraordinarily which is what we need at the moment, in this situation media, civil society and foreign observers must monitor the transparency of collected fund and speed up their efforts to distribute it to the needy as soon as possible. Let’s make sure that opportunists and our corrupted leaders don't get benefited this time

• it’s amazing to see the unity of Nepalese in and outside the country and hats off to them who have been supporting our people in every possible ways. This unity has given hope to save Nepal which was politically about to get fragmented due to our corrupted political parties. Guys, lets continue to be vigilant and let’s keep adding pressure to our government to make them more active

VERY IMPORTANT

• News of India spying in Tibet during rescue operations at midnight is popping out this morning but whose role is to monitor all these activities, why our government can't include Nepali civil society member or an observer with every rescue team? Guys let’s not be too racist this time as individuals, various ethnic and religious groups and organisations are sending tons of food on their behalf

• Prachanda, come on.... how on earth can you open an individual or a party based bank A/C to collect donations? If you are a true communist leader, this is not a proper time to organise a press conference in Paris Hill, go to the field and be with the people suffering in an open space. Baburam, Jhalanath, Gagan Thapa and other political leaders where are your paid party cadres now? You have to mobilize them now, if not now, then when? 

Waiting for a worthy political hero

Parash……Parash….. Parash…….!!!

While ex-prince Parash Shah continues to be in media highlights for his different controversies, the captain of Nepal’s national Cricket team Parash Khadka is in positive limelight for leading his team successfully in T20 World Cup Cricket in Bangladesh last year. Though the team couldn't qualify for semifinal, they received a heroic welcome upon their arrival from Bangladesh and till today their outstanding performance against Afghanistan is still fresh in our minds. What everybody admires the most is the positive and productive leadership of the captain Parash Khadka who is always focused to bring improvement in the team, learn from his mistakes and work for the better result. It’s probably because of his calm and candid personality; people believe in him and youth consider him a real hero.

In cricket Parash brings the magic, in Nepali cinemas actor Rajesh Hamal is entitled the ‘Mahanayak’ and our Gurkhas are considered to be the bravest soldiers in the world but when it comes to Nepali politics why don’t we have real heroes, not even a praiseworthy hero?

The revolution of 1951, also known as ‘Saat Salko kranti’ sidelined the undemocratic Rana dynasty abolishing the institutionalized autocrat hereditary Prime Minister system in Nepal. In essence the country got rid of Ranas but Panchayat system couldn't address the aspiration of the then society and unified movement of different political parties in 1990 called People's Movement /Jana Andolan introduced a constitutional multiparty democracy system in Nepal bringing an end to absolute monarchy and eliminating the Panchayat system which certainly offered some democratic freedom to people but again 10 years long Maoist insurgency changed the entire political spectrum of Nepal. The war between Maoist and the state killed thousands of people resulting the immeasurable damage of social infrastructures. In 2006, King’s Gyanendra’s undemocratic move was declared as a political coop by major political parties of Nepal and People’s movement/ Jana Andolan II stripped the king of many of his powers. After Maoists came into the peace process the country had its first Constituent Assembly Election on 10 April 2008 and Maoist party emerged as the biggest political party.  The 1st Nepalese Constituent Assembly comprised of 601 members officially declared a republic system at its first meeting on May 28, 2008, abolishing the monarchy system in Nepal and Ram Baran Yadav became the first president of Nepal. The misunderstanding among 3 major political parties, Nepali Congress, Maoist and CPN UML and power sharing issues and disagreement on many political agendas extended the political uncertainty and 2nd Constituent Assembly Election was held in 2013 after the failure the first Constituent Assembly to pass a new constitution. Till today, the ongoing political crisis hasn't found its solution and the political stalemate still continues.

This way, in the last 64 years of democracy in Nepal, we have witnessed revolutions, political changes and dozens of government led by different political parties but ordinary people are not able to experience better governance as massive unemployment, poverty, inequality, discrimination and many social, economic and cultural problems have worsen their situation.  The country has been lurching from crisis to crisis for years. Especially when the Maoists party came into the power with the slogan of ‘New Nepal’ people expected more developments and positive changes from them but Prachanda and much anticipated Dr Baburam Bhattarai both failed to bring their promised drastic change. Big faces like Jhalanath Khanal, Madhav Kumar Nepal, Sushil Koirala, Sher bahadur Deuba, Lokendra Bahadur Chand, late Girija Prasad Koirala, Surya Bahadur Thapa and many more have already been in the prime ministerial hot seat but none could free the country from dirty political quagmire. Late Bisheshwor Prasad Koirala, Man Mohan Adhikari, Madan Bhandari, Krishna Prashad Bhattrai and Ganesh Man Singh were comparatively respectable figures in Nepali political leadership but people didn't get much from them either.

The blame culture is the most common characteristics found in Nepali politicians and nobody seems to have an ability to admit that they are wrong when they make mistakes, rather than to carry on and lead to disaster. When they are questioned about the current political crisis, mismanagement and the lack of developments in the country, almost everyone keeps blaming each other but majority of the people believe that the country has just found corrupted leaders and some good ones couldn't prove their potential.While searching for the recipe of world’s few successful political leaders, it looks like those who help the whole country rather than sections of it are mostly admired by the people. When South Africa was breaking up in racial strife, Mandela prevented it by drawing a visionary line under the sins of the past. Similarly Mahatma Gandhi not just led the non-violent struggle to achieve India’s freedom but also worked smartly in motivating and mobilizing the masses of India across the states, regardless of their differences in language, caste, religion, creed and sex, to unite together and fight for the cause of freedom where as our current politicians represent just a certain class or a particular faction of the society.

When we send them into power, they are supposed to represent our views and look after our interests but it’s not happening. A good leader doesn't lead by telling people what to do but by figuring out, from our collective wisdom, what is the most effective course of action and then trying to convince all people that this is the best course.  Instead of finding the views of the inarticulate and powerless, our leaders just know how to lie and force people to participate in protests and strikes in the country to fulfil their ends.  

Our politicians please their voters during the election campaigns and once they reach Singh Durbar, none seems to bother about the sufferings of ordinary Nepali living in and outside the country. Our big labour forces that have changed the face of Dubai, Qatar, Saudi Arabia and many other Gulf countries are enslaved there and many of them are treated like animals but none of our governments have made any adequate attempts to exercise top level diplomacy in order to ensure their safety, security and wellbeing. Every week, poor families are compelled to receive dozens of dead bodies of their beloved ones but still the grief cannot touch the soul of our stone hearted politicians.

Real leaders sacrifice their self-interest in the interest of nation & its people but majority our politicians are not driven with this principle. People have witnessed the lavish lifestyles of many communist politicians of Nepal who are supposed to serve and uplift the situation of the poorest of the poor, the downtrodden and the enslaved, the weak and the discriminated.  None is expecting a super hero who can change the country’s situation overnight. Nepali people are desperately waiting for someone who is brave enough to take some risks but save the country from the ongoing political crisis and external interference. Social workers Anuradha Koirala and Pushpa Basnet were recognised as CNN hero in 2010 and 2012 respectively. Nepali born Gautam Buddha became the light of the world for peace and spiritual awareness but still our country waits for a worthy political leader, a hero who can win the hearts of Nepalese and provide them what they really deserve.

Wounded World, Politics & Peace

The above heartbreaking image of a four-year-old Syrian girl with hands raised over her head captured by a Turkish photographer Osman Sagiri at the Atmen refugee camp near the Syrian border to Turkey has gone viral in the recent days proving that a photo speaks more than 1000 words.The child surrendered when she mistook the photographer’s camera for a gun which vividly reflects the utter fear present in the mind of innocents and victims living in the war zones.

While the entire world is still reacting on this photo, I felt like sharing my opinion about the bigger picture of today’s war crisis around the world and what ways conflicts and wars can be stopped to establish peace and harmony.

It might be completely unreal to imagine a violence free world as minor conflicts happen in every family but the extent of human slaughtering we have seen in Africa, Middle East and almost around the world is pretty much in the process of wiping the whole humanity. Many ongoing armed conflicts around the world are definitely serving the interest of so called world superpowers who want to exert influence or project power on a global scale. War in Afghanistan, Syria, Iraq, Libya, Israel, Palestine, Pakistan, Somalia, Ukraine and many other countries in the world might have started because of different social, political, religious and cultural reasons but the outcome is the immeasurable loss of innocent lives, social infrastructures and hopes of the alive.

Poverty, inequality, unemployment, corruption, racial attacks and several other reasons could have pushed ordinary people in the street for their rights and has certainly created civil wars in many countries but the bigger war we have seen in Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Palestine, Ukraine is clearly the result of the vested interest of superpowers like America, Russia, Britain and others. When the poor countries and people are suffering to solve their hand to mouth problem, how can a group of that state afford to buy a million dollar worth of arms and ammunition?

The Stockholm International Peace Research Institute provides the list of world’s largest arms exporters and how much money they are making from it.The units in this table are so-called trend indicator values expressed in millions of US $ at 1990s prices. These values do not represent real financial flows but are a crude instrument to estimate volumes of arms transfers, regardless of the contracted prices, which can be as low as zero in the case of military aid. Ordered by descending 2013 values.  

2013 rank	Supplier	Arms exports
1	Russia	8283
2	United States	6153
3	China	1837
4	France	1489
5	United Kingdom	1394
6	Germany	972
7	Italy	807
8	Israel	773
9	Spain	605
10	Ukraine	589
11	Sweden	505
12	Belarus	338
13	South Korea	307
14	Netherlands	302
15	Switzerland	205

It’s now crystal clear that the export of arms and weapons is one of the biggest sources of income to these developed countries mentioned above and in order to continue the supply of such tools, war and battles are compulsory. They can’t be used to irrigate the deserted land nor can they be helpful to develop infrastructure, instead they are designed for destroying the humanity and their infrastructures. When civil war or some minor conflict arise in any country, it ultimately awakens the ‘United Nations Security Council’ which is responsible for restoring peace and security but all the five permanent members of the 'United Nations Security Council'- Russia, China, France, United Kingdom and United States of America are proven to be the five biggest arm suppliers in the world. What could Security Council do when one of its fellow members attacked Ukraine and took control over Crimea? The time has come for us to open our eyes and speak what’s really going on. Today people with money can buy dangerous weapons from political and business mafias in every corners of the world. The biggest superpower USA allows its people to buy weapons legally in their own country. 2012 Aurora shooting demonstrated how ordinary people lose their life in one of the most powerful countries in the world. Such realities become mundane news stories to their government and they continue repeating their speech of commitment to provide peace and justice to the people in war zones. Why and how can we believe them when their actions are totally the opposite?

System of governance, political ideology, religion and several other factors are seen as media to create political turmoil and instability in the developing nations so that these developed nations can interfere there and lengthen the political insurgency which will allow them to continue their business of arm export. Humanitarian aid offered by these giant nations to the victims in war areas are just temporary and no one can guarantee food, shelter and security to them. To me it doesn't make much sense when you create war, you make people suffer and then you yourself promise to provide peace and security to these people. Armies are created in the name of national defense and the trained manpower is pushed to the war zones in order to make them play the holi of their own life. Many of them die giving the medals of their bravery to their family and many more are trained to be sacrificed and this cycle continues. Undoubtedly the fear of terrorism and vandalism must stop promptly but in the excuse of peacekeeping we shouldn't allow these cunning gamers to plan a bigger game of mass destruction. While discussing these issues, it reminds me of the movie ‘Hunger Games’ in which the game is deliberately designed to kill people. The current conflicts around the world don't look that much different but certainly going on in a bigger scale.

Unfortunately, we don’t react equally when the same degree of violence and accidents takes place in different parts of the world. September 11 event in USA, Charlie Hebdo shooting in France, 2008 Mumbai attack got a massive global reaction and media attention but a lot of people around the world these days are used to listening and hearing the ongoing political crisis in Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Palestine, Africa and different developing countries around the world. The outbreak of Ebola has killed thousands of lives in Africa but why are these super powers not showing any urgency to save more lives and why the rest of us are not raising our voice louder enough? The rapid rattle of the shuttering rifles and explosive bombs can never create a peaceful society. In order to minimize current wars and political monopolies around the world and possibly to eradicate them, I believe the following things can be done:

   World superpowers must stop the manufacture and export of arms and ammunition and they   should invest their economic power in the elimination of absolute poverty, unemployment, inequality and social injustice around the world. Their attention to the global economic and social problem must be their first priority instead of venturing in Moon and Mars

   People involved in revolution and wars must be encouraged to come in a peace process and both governments and different revolutionary and armed forces of different countries should make multiple attempts to sort out the issues through mutual trust and negotiation. Disarming of the revolutionary cadres always becomes the priority of governments and mediators in such process which is understandable but if developed countries stop the business of manufacturing and supplying of such arms, this process can be a lot easier

   The International Court of Justice must be made more powerful and all countries in the world must have opportunity to appoint the right people in the judiciary

People of each developing country must choose morally strong and committed political leaders, not the politicians so that the country’s sovereignty remains strong. The accountable government led by real leaders will work for the benefits of people whereas sending corrupted leaders in power will invite foreign intervention

Ethnic, linguistic, religious, cultural and social diversity in a society must be respected and racial attack and discrimination on any basis must be avoided

People of the country must remain as watchdogs and once people in the power fails to accomplish their agenda as per committed deadline, massive public pressure must erupt out to kick corrupts and replace them with better leaders. If the trusted government fails to accomplish its agendas, people mustn't wait for the next election

The state must create a powerful mechanism to investigate the assets of politicians and control them from the corruption

Many big media are owned by corporate and are biased, so a civil society or citizens journalists can create a powerful media to inform people with the correct and reliable information of different political, social and cultural events. In this regard, social media are doing amazing job these days

The judicial system must be free from political influence and the country must have fast track courts for the speedy address of the serious social and political crimes and misconducts

Developing nations must unite for a common benefit to pressurize big powers to take right steps in case of political emergency

Social icons, singers, dancers, movie stars, sports celebrities, writers and social activists must unite together as opinion leaders as people favor them more than the politicians. In real need, the unity can be helpful to bring the correct political changes

We all have to be morally strong, self-disciplined, cooperative, less materialistic and spiritual to find more peace within ourselves

We all must accept the reality of the current world and act accordingly. We may not be able to live in a completely violence free society but the concept of the world peace is an idea of planetary nonviolence, freedom and happiness and this dream can be the reality if we can at least make our government more publicly responsible , ethically professional and corrupt free. If an individual like Mahatma Gandhi, Nelson Mandela, Martin Luther King and Buddha could bring so many amazing changes in the world; I believe the unity of mammoth positive individuals can certainly make this world a better place to live in. It’s definitely sad to see people of this world killing each other and destroying our own brothers and sisters. I reckon if alien attacks humanity in any stage, probably the world might be free of boundaries, class, colors and prosperity as our unity would be vital to save our existence. Let’s hope we don’t have to wait till then.