Wednesday, April 27, 2011
Saturday, April 23, 2011
Enduring Everest By Ajay Thakur
Enduring Everest By Ajay Thakur
Enduring Everest By Ajay Thakur
Chapter 7: Letter From Ministry
It was one December morning, unusually bright, as the mist of pollution had settled down with the rains day before, making snow visible on the mountains far beyond in Nagarkot, like a deity. Sky was clear and spotless, sun felt cold as the wind blew unkindly. I put on my big jacket which I had bought in Buffalo.
It felt good walking and most things passed unnoticed, in the joyfulness of the morning.
Unlike most other ministries, health ministry was in a modern new building, with the red bricks wall. Just beside the main entrance, there was a small army post, with two army personnel pointing the gun towards the gate through a hole, each had the finger on their trigger; it seemed comical as it implied, they sure knew the trouble will start in the front. As I entered the gate, one of them called and asked me for the identity card. I showed my citizenship card. They inquired about the purpose of my visit. I need letter of statement from Health Ministry for my training in United States, said I. They were amused hearing United States. They asked with great interest about America.
With some brief, but delightful conversation on their calm curiosity, they asked me to sign my name and let me in. I walked to the information desk, and asked a smaller looking fat man behind the glass about the secretary’s office. The man was talking on the phone really loud, as if the person on the other end were deaf; his hands movement mimicking some kind of chorea, continued at his leisure showing no sign to end.
Seemingly annoyed at my intrusion, he pointed up with the fingers, with unrestrained irritability.
Enduring Everest By Ajay Thakur
I took stairs. There was no sign of inefficiency or lack of economy in the building; the erection of monument, for it’s paradox, was aesthetically indefensible as it represented health of a country where maternal mortality was still highest on this planet, but I invited no other thoughts beyond a shame. In few minutes, a man readily approached me and asked, if he can help. At the time of insurrection, strangers wandering in the building must have made him paranoid, but his tone lacked any of those concerns. He took me to Nirakarman Shrestha’s office, the health secretary then.
A gentle looking woman, in red sweater and red scarf, sat at a desk, in front of the secretary’s office. She was the personal assistant of Nirakar Man Shrestha. I approached her and explained to her about the letter. She seemed familiar with the kind, I was talking about. She asked me to come in a week, she will have it ready. The conversation was unusually simple and straight. Considering, I just had come from United States, still little delirious of its effects, her courteous manner struck me as Déjà Vu. I thanked her, promising to be back again. Next week, she told me that Dr Shrestha was on vacation, and I might have to wait another two weeks. I went back twice after that man had returned from his vacation, but couldn’t see him, as he was always in some kind of meetings; it frustrated me.
Almost after four weeks of my initial visit, I had a chance to see him. The meeting was marked by brevity and refusal to give me the letter I needed. He dismissed me saying “Nepali Government has decided not to issue the letter.”..... Law of the land changed overnight, but his curtness stunned me. He pressed a buzzer on his desk, the door opened and the secretary lady anxiously asked me to come out.
She had a look on her face “What happened?”, as for sure, she had not anticipated any problem.
Enduring Everest By Ajay Thakur
Just few weeks old, I was puffed up with conceit, rapidly it evaporated like a monsoon rain in Terai. My rage was so acute to find the odd secrets of where I stood in my own country, that my pride receded in disappointment and my worthiness filled suddenly with doubts.
“We could do nothing without his signature.”- She told me, in a casual easiness, as if her perverse sympathy begged the conclusion of a justifiable horror. I looked back on her, ungrateful and unimpressed. For few minutes, couldn’t think straight, knowing not what to do, I implied not leaving until I see someone else.
She showed weariness to the vicissitudes of event, but her promptness to admit the unacquaintedness of similar case gave me a fresh misery and strengthened the distaste of everything and everyone around. I was furious, knowing most people, who applied for the same letter, had received without any inconvenience before.
Confused lady hurriedly took me to different office, seemingly, happy to get rid of me, at the time.
This new person (I hardly remember his name) seemed to have a good eye contact, and was engaging in conversation.
With a degree of moderation and composure, which seemed consistent with the common feelings of an educated man, he offered to explain, at times, in a tangential manner, about the brain drain. His lecture lasted about twenty minutes before he asked me anything.
Enduring Everest By Ajay Thakur
One was utterly rude and hostile, another was articulate with ostentatious wit; message was plain and simple. I felt betrayed by own health ministry. The concept of brain drain seemed to have been constructed to coerce me, and I, surely, made no effort to appreciate it’s austerity.
Unrestrained anger, I could feel a throb chocking my throat during his lecture. He was done talking.
“What is your Name?” he asked.
“Ajay Thakur, Sir. I have a residency spot in University of Pittsburgh in America that requires Letter of statement from this office.” I felt pity for my self-pity.
“I can’t promise but I will take a look, meet me tomorrow at 1 p.m.” he suggested.
I left with a whispering thank you.
Crash course of Nepali bureaucracy had lasted for at least two hours, but seemed longer to me, now with cumulous cloud of uncertainty - felt almost endless. What if they don’t change their mind tomorrow? It already had dragged longer than I expected. I remained anxiously hopeful in human fallibility, not just in virtues but also in their vice.
Enduring Everest By Ajay Thakur
The army waved at me on the way out of the building, the fact that they were protecting somebody like Nirakarman Shrestha was inexplicably incomprehensible to me. Embittered and filled with rage, I set to walk back to my clinic, following the curves at Singha durbar, in front of Bhrikuti Mandap and through Sahid gate. On the way, I noticed unusual nakedness of December trees, dishcloth Bhrikuti Mandap, and barrenness of Tundikhel. I noticed thick fog of pollution, barely seeing beyond a mile.... The constant honking of mini-bus terribly loud..... I noticed the street kids collecting plastic bags, running back and forth, across the street......they were so free, free of all the necessity to identify themselves of any relevance, and here I was, with profession of highest order in my country, carrying a meaningless piece of paper (citizenship card) which identified nothing. Nothingness loathed me, as I dragged on my feet.
I reached life care clinic looking sad. Rauniyar and Tripathi, still seeing their last patient, asked me “what happened?” They knew, I had gone to health ministry for a letter.
“They refused to give me letter, saying health ministry changed the law.” I said.
“My brother is a politician and he knows people, I will talk to him.” said Tripathi, looking at everyone in the room, but talking to me.
Conversation on the subject of prevailing prejudice and corruption lasted for another hour. Artless representation of their sympathy seemed to take a quality of identification, as if I gave them a chance to feel victimized. Whatever the merits of their argument, the skill with which it was put together made me uncomfortable. It gave me a sense that prejudice would yet prevail based on which side one is born; pahade vs. madheshi, high caste vs. low caste, politically connected vs. unconnected... so on and so forth. The distinctive ugliness of recrimination would fly thick and fast between these feuding classes even with reversal of their fate. It would read like a palindrome no matter what.
Enduring Everest By Ajay Thakur
Despite all his education and authority, a psychiatrist by training, Shrestha had lacked any introspection into his own moral decay. But it wasn’t just the Shrestha that surprised me. It was also Tripathi whose abhorring counter arguments made me sick. His flattering effort to be useful and narcissistic account of political self absorption was disturbingly annoying.
At the moment it seemed to reduce me further, of any particular significance. He represented the phoniness of post-1990, prosperity and self satisfaction of few Madhesi over the wretchedness of multitudes. He belonged to class of people who always seemed to add to the insult of many for being insignificant without them. He equally lacked any reflection or earnestness, despite his impatient desire to show solidarity with me.
At 3.30 p.m., it was time for me to finish and go home.
As usual, I took the mini-bus to Jorpaty. I sat in one corner and opened the window. Whispering breeze filled with dust and smoke seemed to express some feelings- not the insolent kind, like the one I felt few minutes before. In that forty five minutes journey to my home, as a result of some interference in my hypothalamus, kinaesthesia impeded dysesthesia and my dizziness seemed to relieve. I liked the solitude of that moving bus.
I reached home, and Kavita was waiting for me, all excited to go out. Unable to commit anything, I simply said, I had a bad headache and lied on my bed. She brought me tea and sat beside me. Her body had softness and great warmth. As if fear of failure had caused an eruption of greater tenderness inside me, I held her tight and fell asleep...
Enduring Everest By Ajay Thakur
I woke up about the dinner time, half delirious yet the throb of headache coursing through my head was impossible to ignore. I called my father from a local booth explaining the day. My father, realizing I was upset, tried to explain with lots of pause and silence on his end, letting un-intercepted ventilation. At times, he wondered if I was calling him from a prison, as the degree of abhorrence made him hard to believe, I came through all those perils unscathed. He saw the danger in my perverse insistence for the letter, as it might somehow be mistaken for an association with violent groups or the ongoing act of subversion, he thought. The conversation ended inconclusively, as to volunteer listening to him was too much an effort, I found.
I had lived my life unconcerned to the matters like this, at times, indifferent to my own Madheshi background, but now I felt so naive to suppose my indifference was shared by the people on other side of social geography. As a matter of fact, it was not too bad until I had a dream or a future. In Buffalo, I had witnessed a qualitative shift in the way some stranger would treat me, but here I was faced to seek the good of men filled with prejudice, as sanction for my right to pursue the future that I want. The burgeoning of a fragile dream seemed receding back, even before it had begun.
My father must have had his share of imposition; everyday refusal of acceptance, denial of a dignity, and so many other things he would never talk about. He had admirably adapted to its course, with the load of unearned guilt he came to deserve for belonging to Madhesh, and that had remained largely unknown to my grandfather. He endured it, without ever complaining; I was the one impatient kind, mistaking his carefulness for his lack of empathy in this capricious climate.
Enduring Everest By Ajay Thakur
It would become clear to me, in years to come, that survival depended on quality of his, in the places like Nepal, which I would have yet to learn.
All night, I could not sleep. I inhaled and held my breath, and then painfully releasing it, making Kavita acutely aware what was going through my mind. I tried to perceive the provenance of my contentious past, revisiting the history in absurdity. Next morning I felt worse. I asked Kavita if there was enough water for me to take a bathe, she said no. I dressed up and went to clinic disheveled; humidity made my cloth stick to my skin and it felt uncomfortable all day. Later at noon, I walked to the ministry again. The lady smiled and handed me a folder. I thanked her, in earnest.
Two months later, I was notified by ECFMG, about a mistake in that document, and it would need correction, my heart sank!!
#################################################
Brain drain, no doubt, is a tremendous problem and countries facing it are overwhelmingly undeveloped. Migration of human capital is the greatest loss. However, what one has to understand is that developing countries are poor not because everybody in those countries are poor, but because it has the worst economic and opportunity stratifications. The difference between rich and poor is not just the assets, but the distance and degree of access to the information and education and well beyond. An educated young man from privileged minority has easy transition into adult life within the country or outside; one from humble majority confronts obscurantism. (According to Nepal Living Standard Survey (NLSS) 2003/04, during the last eight years, Gini-coefficient which shows the inequality of income distribution has increased from 0.34 to 0.41 which indicates that the gap between the rich and the poor has increased further.)
Enduring Everest By Ajay Thakur
For all its benevolence, the entire philosophy of brain drain seemed to me, a cryptogram to coerce others or deny them the freedom of choice based on class. It bestowed favouritisms. It was pitiable for them to give me lectures about it, as I knew one of theirs daughter too was coming for the residency the same year. I am sure the law of the land didn’t apply to her.
#################################################
Janakpur is land of Maithili people. Mark Moxon in his travel diary wrote “Janakpur is an Indian town in all but geography”, that is part-true and part-tragic. Any central government treated this region as far from source of beauty and grace, not to mention, not sexy like mountains. (Tourism never happened in Madhesh). The fertile land was treated as mistake by all kinds of people in Government, and it was a liability to be born there, I would come to know.
Enduring Everest By Ajay Thakur
Enduring Everest By Ajay Thakur
Madhesi Self Hate
Enduring Everest By Ajay Thakur
Chapter 7: Letter From Ministry
It was one December morning, unusually bright, as the mist of pollution had settled down with the rains day before, making snow visible on the mountains far beyond in Nagarkot, like a deity. Sky was clear and spotless, sun felt cold as the wind blew unkindly. I put on my big jacket which I had bought in Buffalo.
It felt good walking and most things passed unnoticed, in the joyfulness of the morning.
Unlike most other ministries, health ministry was in a modern new building, with the red bricks wall. Just beside the main entrance, there was a small army post, with two army personnel pointing the gun towards the gate through a hole, each had the finger on their trigger; it seemed comical as it implied, they sure knew the trouble will start in the front. As I entered the gate, one of them called and asked me for the identity card. I showed my citizenship card. They inquired about the purpose of my visit. I need letter of statement from Health Ministry for my training in United States, said I. They were amused hearing United States. They asked with great interest about America.
With some brief, but delightful conversation on their calm curiosity, they asked me to sign my name and let me in. I walked to the information desk, and asked a smaller looking fat man behind the glass about the secretary’s office. The man was talking on the phone really loud, as if the person on the other end were deaf; his hands movement mimicking some kind of chorea, continued at his leisure showing no sign to end.
Seemingly annoyed at my intrusion, he pointed up with the fingers, with unrestrained irritability.
Enduring Everest By Ajay Thakur
I took stairs. There was no sign of inefficiency or lack of economy in the building; the erection of monument, for it’s paradox, was aesthetically indefensible as it represented health of a country where maternal mortality was still highest on this planet, but I invited no other thoughts beyond a shame. In few minutes, a man readily approached me and asked, if he can help. At the time of insurrection, strangers wandering in the building must have made him paranoid, but his tone lacked any of those concerns. He took me to Nirakarman Shrestha’s office, the health secretary then.
A gentle looking woman, in red sweater and red scarf, sat at a desk, in front of the secretary’s office. She was the personal assistant of Nirakar Man Shrestha. I approached her and explained to her about the letter. She seemed familiar with the kind, I was talking about. She asked me to come in a week, she will have it ready. The conversation was unusually simple and straight. Considering, I just had come from United States, still little delirious of its effects, her courteous manner struck me as Déjà Vu. I thanked her, promising to be back again. Next week, she told me that Dr Shrestha was on vacation, and I might have to wait another two weeks. I went back twice after that man had returned from his vacation, but couldn’t see him, as he was always in some kind of meetings; it frustrated me.
Almost after four weeks of my initial visit, I had a chance to see him. The meeting was marked by brevity and refusal to give me the letter I needed. He dismissed me saying “Nepali Government has decided not to issue the letter.”..... Law of the land changed overnight, but his curtness stunned me. He pressed a buzzer on his desk, the door opened and the secretary lady anxiously asked me to come out.
She had a look on her face “What happened?”, as for sure, she had not anticipated any problem.
Enduring Everest By Ajay Thakur
Just few weeks old, I was puffed up with conceit, rapidly it evaporated like a monsoon rain in Terai. My rage was so acute to find the odd secrets of where I stood in my own country, that my pride receded in disappointment and my worthiness filled suddenly with doubts.
“We could do nothing without his signature.”- She told me, in a casual easiness, as if her perverse sympathy begged the conclusion of a justifiable horror. I looked back on her, ungrateful and unimpressed. For few minutes, couldn’t think straight, knowing not what to do, I implied not leaving until I see someone else.
She showed weariness to the vicissitudes of event, but her promptness to admit the unacquaintedness of similar case gave me a fresh misery and strengthened the distaste of everything and everyone around. I was furious, knowing most people, who applied for the same letter, had received without any inconvenience before.
Confused lady hurriedly took me to different office, seemingly, happy to get rid of me, at the time.
This new person (I hardly remember his name) seemed to have a good eye contact, and was engaging in conversation.
With a degree of moderation and composure, which seemed consistent with the common feelings of an educated man, he offered to explain, at times, in a tangential manner, about the brain drain. His lecture lasted about twenty minutes before he asked me anything.
Enduring Everest By Ajay Thakur
One was utterly rude and hostile, another was articulate with ostentatious wit; message was plain and simple. I felt betrayed by own health ministry. The concept of brain drain seemed to have been constructed to coerce me, and I, surely, made no effort to appreciate it’s austerity.
Unrestrained anger, I could feel a throb chocking my throat during his lecture. He was done talking.
“What is your Name?” he asked.
“Ajay Thakur, Sir. I have a residency spot in University of Pittsburgh in America that requires Letter of statement from this office.” I felt pity for my self-pity.
“I can’t promise but I will take a look, meet me tomorrow at 1 p.m.” he suggested.
I left with a whispering thank you.
Crash course of Nepali bureaucracy had lasted for at least two hours, but seemed longer to me, now with cumulous cloud of uncertainty - felt almost endless. What if they don’t change their mind tomorrow? It already had dragged longer than I expected. I remained anxiously hopeful in human fallibility, not just in virtues but also in their vice.
Enduring Everest By Ajay Thakur
The army waved at me on the way out of the building, the fact that they were protecting somebody like Nirakarman Shrestha was inexplicably incomprehensible to me. Embittered and filled with rage, I set to walk back to my clinic, following the curves at Singha durbar, in front of Bhrikuti Mandap and through Sahid gate. On the way, I noticed unusual nakedness of December trees, dishcloth Bhrikuti Mandap, and barrenness of Tundikhel. I noticed thick fog of pollution, barely seeing beyond a mile.... The constant honking of mini-bus terribly loud..... I noticed the street kids collecting plastic bags, running back and forth, across the street......they were so free, free of all the necessity to identify themselves of any relevance, and here I was, with profession of highest order in my country, carrying a meaningless piece of paper (citizenship card) which identified nothing. Nothingness loathed me, as I dragged on my feet.
I reached life care clinic looking sad. Rauniyar and Tripathi, still seeing their last patient, asked me “what happened?” They knew, I had gone to health ministry for a letter.
“They refused to give me letter, saying health ministry changed the law.” I said.
“My brother is a politician and he knows people, I will talk to him.” said Tripathi, looking at everyone in the room, but talking to me.
Conversation on the subject of prevailing prejudice and corruption lasted for another hour. Artless representation of their sympathy seemed to take a quality of identification, as if I gave them a chance to feel victimized. Whatever the merits of their argument, the skill with which it was put together made me uncomfortable. It gave me a sense that prejudice would yet prevail based on which side one is born; pahade vs. madheshi, high caste vs. low caste, politically connected vs. unconnected... so on and so forth. The distinctive ugliness of recrimination would fly thick and fast between these feuding classes even with reversal of their fate. It would read like a palindrome no matter what.
Enduring Everest By Ajay Thakur
Despite all his education and authority, a psychiatrist by training, Shrestha had lacked any introspection into his own moral decay. But it wasn’t just the Shrestha that surprised me. It was also Tripathi whose abhorring counter arguments made me sick. His flattering effort to be useful and narcissistic account of political self absorption was disturbingly annoying.
At the moment it seemed to reduce me further, of any particular significance. He represented the phoniness of post-1990, prosperity and self satisfaction of few Madhesi over the wretchedness of multitudes. He belonged to class of people who always seemed to add to the insult of many for being insignificant without them. He equally lacked any reflection or earnestness, despite his impatient desire to show solidarity with me.
At 3.30 p.m., it was time for me to finish and go home.
As usual, I took the mini-bus to Jorpaty. I sat in one corner and opened the window. Whispering breeze filled with dust and smoke seemed to express some feelings- not the insolent kind, like the one I felt few minutes before. In that forty five minutes journey to my home, as a result of some interference in my hypothalamus, kinaesthesia impeded dysesthesia and my dizziness seemed to relieve. I liked the solitude of that moving bus.
I reached home, and Kavita was waiting for me, all excited to go out. Unable to commit anything, I simply said, I had a bad headache and lied on my bed. She brought me tea and sat beside me. Her body had softness and great warmth. As if fear of failure had caused an eruption of greater tenderness inside me, I held her tight and fell asleep...
Enduring Everest By Ajay Thakur
I woke up about the dinner time, half delirious yet the throb of headache coursing through my head was impossible to ignore. I called my father from a local booth explaining the day. My father, realizing I was upset, tried to explain with lots of pause and silence on his end, letting un-intercepted ventilation. At times, he wondered if I was calling him from a prison, as the degree of abhorrence made him hard to believe, I came through all those perils unscathed. He saw the danger in my perverse insistence for the letter, as it might somehow be mistaken for an association with violent groups or the ongoing act of subversion, he thought. The conversation ended inconclusively, as to volunteer listening to him was too much an effort, I found.
I had lived my life unconcerned to the matters like this, at times, indifferent to my own Madheshi background, but now I felt so naive to suppose my indifference was shared by the people on other side of social geography. As a matter of fact, it was not too bad until I had a dream or a future. In Buffalo, I had witnessed a qualitative shift in the way some stranger would treat me, but here I was faced to seek the good of men filled with prejudice, as sanction for my right to pursue the future that I want. The burgeoning of a fragile dream seemed receding back, even before it had begun.
My father must have had his share of imposition; everyday refusal of acceptance, denial of a dignity, and so many other things he would never talk about. He had admirably adapted to its course, with the load of unearned guilt he came to deserve for belonging to Madhesh, and that had remained largely unknown to my grandfather. He endured it, without ever complaining; I was the one impatient kind, mistaking his carefulness for his lack of empathy in this capricious climate.
Enduring Everest By Ajay Thakur
It would become clear to me, in years to come, that survival depended on quality of his, in the places like Nepal, which I would have yet to learn.
All night, I could not sleep. I inhaled and held my breath, and then painfully releasing it, making Kavita acutely aware what was going through my mind. I tried to perceive the provenance of my contentious past, revisiting the history in absurdity. Next morning I felt worse. I asked Kavita if there was enough water for me to take a bathe, she said no. I dressed up and went to clinic disheveled; humidity made my cloth stick to my skin and it felt uncomfortable all day. Later at noon, I walked to the ministry again. The lady smiled and handed me a folder. I thanked her, in earnest.
Two months later, I was notified by ECFMG, about a mistake in that document, and it would need correction, my heart sank!!
#################################################
Brain drain, no doubt, is a tremendous problem and countries facing it are overwhelmingly undeveloped. Migration of human capital is the greatest loss. However, what one has to understand is that developing countries are poor not because everybody in those countries are poor, but because it has the worst economic and opportunity stratifications. The difference between rich and poor is not just the assets, but the distance and degree of access to the information and education and well beyond. An educated young man from privileged minority has easy transition into adult life within the country or outside; one from humble majority confronts obscurantism. (According to Nepal Living Standard Survey (NLSS) 2003/04, during the last eight years, Gini-coefficient which shows the inequality of income distribution has increased from 0.34 to 0.41 which indicates that the gap between the rich and the poor has increased further.)
Enduring Everest By Ajay Thakur
For all its benevolence, the entire philosophy of brain drain seemed to me, a cryptogram to coerce others or deny them the freedom of choice based on class. It bestowed favouritisms. It was pitiable for them to give me lectures about it, as I knew one of theirs daughter too was coming for the residency the same year. I am sure the law of the land didn’t apply to her.
#################################################
Janakpur is land of Maithili people. Mark Moxon in his travel diary wrote “Janakpur is an Indian town in all but geography”, that is part-true and part-tragic. Any central government treated this region as far from source of beauty and grace, not to mention, not sexy like mountains. (Tourism never happened in Madhesh). The fertile land was treated as mistake by all kinds of people in Government, and it was a liability to be born there, I would come to know.
Enduring Everest By Ajay Thakur
Enduring Everest By Ajay Thakur
Madhesi Self Hate
Thursday, April 21, 2011
Nepalis In New York And The NRN Movement
New York City For Barack Obama 1-10
Staff, Volunteers, Elected Officials
DL21C Annual Summer Bash: Barack Won The Straw Poll
The conversation made me think though. I was the only Nepali in America to have worked full time for Nepal's democracy movement of 2006, and later the Madhesi movement. But my style was one of digital activism. I did not join any organization.
I have a newfound interest in Nepal. That's there. But it is hard for me to ignore some of the very real issues the Nepali community in New York City, in America, and the world at large grapples with. Instead of being the best and the brightest who went global and are willing and able to lead Nepal to an era of rapid economic growth, we find little gatherings of locally relatively well to do homesick Nepalis begging the Nepali establishment in Kathmandu for very basic rights. Much of that comes from how we have attempted to organize ourselves. There has been no desire to go mass based. A lacking culture of basic democracy, transparency and egalitarianism has been holding us back.
Kiva Is In Nepal
There are no rich Nepalis in America. If there were, I'd have read about them in some magazine. I never have. So for people who might be in professional white collar jobs to dissociate from the masses who might be working below minimum wage salaries is not classist. It is self destructive behavior. Because the power rests in mass organizing. Power is in numbers. Unless Nepalis get organized in large numbers, we can not better our situation locally, and we can not earn our rights inside Nepal, and we can not help Nepal in major ways.
The well and alive anti Madhesi prejudice among the diaspora Nepalis is another self destructive behavior. Unless the Nepalis in New York City claim their larger South Asian identity, they are not going anywhere. Working for Indian bosses by the day, and talking hate speech against them by the night are not exactly the way to go.
I have no desire to become yet another token Madhesi in New York City. I was one of Barack Obama's top volunteers in the city. This is a city where Indians matter little, and Nepalis are not even on the map anywhere. There has to be an acknowledgment among the Pahadis that things were and are wrong in Nepal and that is why you see so few Madhesis in New York City. Talking hate speech is not how you express that acknowledgment. And there has to be a sense of mutual respect. And we have to forge a new Nepali identity. And that is how we can become better organized.
There are about 50,000 Nepalis in New York City. Most of them party in small groups about once a a week. Identify those party organizers. Every Nepali in the city has a mobile phone. Those parties and those phones are the key to going mass based in terms of organization. 50 white collar Nepalis meeting in some five star hotel is not my idea of a mass based organization. And for as long as we don't go mass based, we will stay largely irrelevant.
Nepali Slaves In The Middle East
Image via Wikipedia
Tuesday, April 12, 2011
Friday, February 04, 2011
A Smart Political Move By Prachanda
Image via WikipediaAn all party government in Baburam Bhattarai's leadership was the best option for the peace process and constitution drafting. But this move by Prachanda to prop up Jhalanath Khanal is smart on Prachanda's part. Jhalanath Khanal has had seniority. He was General Secretary of his party when Madan Bhandari was junior to him. The guy obviously has a long tail.
Hopefully now there will be some political stability and the lawmakers will get down to business.
The smart part is that suddenly Prachanda has forced a political bi-polarization in the country. He has formed a left alliance. By default now you are going to have a non left alliance of the Nepali Congress and the three Madhesi parties. Upendra Yadav has decided he is on the left side. He was a communist all his life before he launched his new party. So that move is not surprising.
The calculation Prachanda has in mind is to do with the elections after the new constitution takes shape. He is envisioning a scenario where the Maoists again emerge the largest party, and if it does not get an outright majority it can rely on Jhalanath Khanal for UML's support to make Prachanda a full four year term Prime Minister under the new constitution. That is what this Prachanda move is about. It has been about slamming the Nepali Congress, its primary ideological rival.
This is a smart move on the part of Prachanda. He has killed two birds with one stone. There is going to be no more talk of Baburam Bhattarai or the Nepali Congress for the top political job for a few years.
As long as there is stability after this, the country will also benefit.
Saturday, November 20, 2010
Monday, September 27, 2010
ANTA Convention: Emotional Bath
Venue: World's Fair Marina (Wikipedia article)
The venue was gorgeous, and the convention lasted for long enough. I got to meet Madhesis I had not met in a while, I got to meet Madhesis I had heard of but had not met yet, number one on that list was Professor JP Sah from Florida, also a Janakpur person like me, one of his daughters is doing a PhD in "aerospace engineering" at Purdue - "I have been to the Purdue campus," I said - I got to meet Madhesis I had not heard of, had never met. It was a good gathering.
When the Chairperson of the convention, Dr. Sukhdev Shah - who worked at the IMF for three decades, was a few years back nominated Nepali ambassador to the US - said that after almost four decades in the US, half a century later seeing people in his homevillage still not having shoes to their feet, he felt like he was from "nowhere." That is when I knew we Madhesis have gone global. Rootlessness is a necessary accompaniment.
There were some surprise moments. The final panel on Saturday was really something. Mukesh Singh said he had only one leg, one leg lost to a motorbike accident - his second leg is prosthetic - and he came to America with 60 dollars in his pocket and now he lives in a million dollar home. Mukesh Singh is a-l-w-a-y-s in a good mood.
In a brief remark Saturday during the cultural program Binod Shah, the ANTA President, thanked his elder brother. He took me to school by my finger, and that is how I became a doctor, he said.
Aditya Jha stayed the entire time. He sold his company to Sun Microsystems for $100 million over a decade back. His homevillage is not far from mine in Nepal. Jha is based out of Toronto. He flew in.
About a dozen people, all of whom had climbed Mount Everest, many several times, had been invited and were felicitated. These were Sherpas, not Madhesis, but what the heck. At lunch on Saturday I found myself sitting next to Adityaji. We were having lunch with these Sherpas. And Adityaji said he was genuinely interested in climbing Mount Everest.
"Can someone like me do it with the help of four Sherpas?" he asked. "How many months of training will it take?"
Ends up Adityaji had raised money for a school one of the Sherpas had gone to high in the Himalayas in his homevillage.
Answer: it can be done. If you have four Sherpas with you, you will not have to worry about oxygen at any point, and that is the primary worry.
By the end of the day Nepal's Home Minister Bhim Rawal had showed up. Former UN Under Secretary General Kul Chandra Gautam - a Nepali - had showed up. He is now retired and lives in Nepal. Famous Nepali movie star/actress Gauri Malla performed.
The missing Madhesi was Upendra Mahato, the richest Nepali in the world. He had some event in London he could not skip. Otherwise.
Upendra Mahato showed up in the Soviet Union as a scholarship student right before it collapsed. The rest, as they say, is history. Mahato owns the building that houses the largest electronics shop in Moscow, for one.
Someone once gave me the simplistic version of how Mahato made it. He became good friends with locals at college who came to power after the Soviet Union collapsed. This was in Belorussia. Spelling? He used those contacts to borrow money from their banks to buy property for cheap. And that is how the vicious cycle began. But there had to have been more than that. He was named Russia's Manager Of The Year in 2008, the year of my Obama 08 personal mess.
"I heard you are rich," someone once said to him.
"You heard it wrong," he said. "I am not rich. I am very rich."
The guy's net worth is in the hundreds of millions. He is the founder of the NRN - Non Resident Nepali - movement. It is global. For the longest time the Nepalis in America resisted. Ends up resistance is futile.
The event was to start at the Himalayan Yak Restaurant in Jackson Heights Friday. My email said 7PM. I showed up at 7PM. True Nepalis don't show up on time. They know. They simply know. They know not to show on time. You don't have to be a VIP. You simply have to be a Nepali. Different cultures understand time differently. Nepalis who don't struggle with showing up for their American jobs on time switch back when it comes to Nepali events. It is a body clock thing.
People started showing up. Divita Mehta - author of the idea that I move to NYC from the Midwest where I was five years ago, Mt. Holyoke star student, a Goldman Sachs Director assistant fresh out of college, investment banker - showed up a little after.
Divita said people handed her Reshma Saujani flyers near her apartment on the Upper East Side.
And then people started percolating in. Jay Mandal - my "friend" within ANTA, San Diego guy - had flown in. Ratan Jha - founding president of ANTA, now NRN global General Secretary - had flown in from Texas. Lalit Jha - my hometown Jankapur guy, best friend to Ratan Jha - had flown in from Nebraska where he is at.
Jay said he also applied for Budhanilkantha but was rejected. I said they also took into account good looks. He gave me a high five on that one.
"You have matured much in four years, become much wiser," Lalitji told me when he first met me Friday evening and again Saturday evening when it was time to say goodbye.
I learned Saturday during a presentation by a Chicago Kharel - a Pahadi - that Ratanji had managed to get a whole bunch of Nepalis to invest in his construction company promising them an annual 12% return. I am like, heck, I was trying to raise money from Nepalis a few years back, I did raise some, but most of my round one came from a local NYC friend, business partner like Adityaji kept telling me needed to happen.
"The money you need you can raise right there in New York!"
Abhi to main Mr. No Green Card hoon. We will cross that bridge when we get there.
By the time the dinner winded down Friday, Binodji is like let's go to my place. The guy's house is in Scarsdale. I call that out of state. So Satendra Shah, Biplav Yadav and I hopped into his van. We - minus Biplav - were up until four in the morning, printing stuff, working on his speech.
The ANTA President is going to show up late for the first ever ANTA Convention, I thought to myself. There is a term for that: Nepali time. The event started late. People just knew not to show up on time. No one seemed to be complaining.
Saturday was panel after panel after panel after panel. What saved the day was food. There was a ton of food. When it was not lunch time yet, it was appetizer time. There was dessert time. Indian dessert is s-w-e-e-t. I don't got no sweet tooth, chocolate does not excite me, but Indian sweets are different. Soon enough it was appetizer time again. Then dinner time. Then dessert time.
Roshan Chaudhary had a name for the icecream served at dessert.
"They got kulfi," he said.
Jackson Heights is Jay Kishan Heights.
Panels are all good, and I attended all of them, listened to all speakers unfailingly. But these Madhesi panels were one way traffic. There were no Q&A sessions. They just were not there.
My brother-in-law Bisundev Mahato was in town for the day. He is in Boston, the first Madhesi ever at Harvard Medical School. He spoke on health care. He also was on the final panel of the day, the best one. Bisun spoke as frankly and boldly as Mukesh Singh. Divita Mehta was on that same panel.
By the time I got home it was Sunday two in the morning. I needed the sleep. I slept like a log. And I needed that shave and that shower when I finally got up.
The ANTA Convention had been an emotional bath.
New York Times: Nice Way To Shea: the new ferry service inaugurated earlier this month between Manhattan and Shea Stadium in Queens offers gentle river breezes and spectacular sunsets denied car or subway travelers. .... In all, the trip to the World's Fair Marina takes less than an hour. Then it's an easy five-minute walk to the stadium.One nagging question ANTA has for me is as to why I will not become a member, why I will not become an office holder, why will I not possibly even lead the organization? Jay Mandal approached me all over again. He said he had a presentation that will convince me to finally sign up.
I launched ANTA in New York Metro, but never joined although I doubt I have missed any major ANTA event in the city over the years.
Becoming a member of ANTA would be like joining the NRN movement. Until the NRN movement achieves the goal of dual citizenship for the NRNs, it is a failure. The NRN movement is Upendra Mahato's thing. It is his space. I support the NRN movement wholeheartedly, but I can't join it any more than I can go work for one of Upendra Mahato's companies.
If I am going to be an entrepreneur, I am going to be a bigger entrepreneur than Upendra Mahato. That is why I can't join ANTA.
For me the question is as to why the Nepalis in New York City don't want voting rights in this city based on residency - not citizenship - like the Irish had in Boston 150 years ago? That entails coalition building with South Asians at large, the Hispanics in the city perhaps.
Internet access is the voting right for this 21st century. Every human being deserves to have big screen broadband. Gandhi and MLK might have been tech entrepreneurs today.
Also, it is not like Mahatma Gandhi needed a political office. I am no Gandhi, never will be, but I don't need an office to do the political work I do.
Rajesh Shah wanted to know why I was now putting some time into Iran's democracy movement.
"I am going to win the Nobel Peace Prize," I said to him. If I can do for Iran what I did for Nepal, that is a Nobel.
Rajesh Shah and Biplav Yadav are both in the Columbus, Ohio, area. Yadav is a doctor, Shah is what I call a tourist. He has a fancy degree in hotel management. Mukesh Singh is in Columbus.
Shah, Yadav, Bisundev Mahato and I, we all went to Budhanilkantha School, as did Sanju Mahato.
Biplav Yadav gave me $100 from a lost bet. In 2007 - "before the primaries," like he likes to say - I bet Barack Obama was going to become president. I am not a betting kind, but this was different.
New York Times: A Manhattan-to-Queens Ferry Is Planned for Mets Fans: New York Waterway, said the company was awaiting final approval to operate the ferry service between the South Street Seaport and the city-owned World's Fair Marina, a quarter of a mile from Shea Stadium..... ''But we think that two years from now, the Shea Stadium ferry will be just as successful as the Yankee Stadium ferry.''"I am not a journalist, I am not a writer, and the word blogger does not even begin to describe me. I am a political activist who uses digital tools," I said in my eight minute presentation. "I was one of Barack Obama's top 20, top 30, perhaps top 10 volunteers in the city. When it was time for the British to finally leave, they said, okay, you can have your independence, but you are going to have to give us Subhash Chandra Bose, dead or alive. When the Mahabharata was over, the Pandavas won, Yudhistir went to see his uncle Dhritarashtra. Come near me, let me embrace you, the old man said. Krishna sensed something was wrong. He made a wax replica of Yudhistir. The blind, old man crushed that statue. Democratic primary khatam huwi 2008 mein aur ye log mere ko under kar diye. Barack Obama jita. Uske chaar deen baad mere ko phir se bahar kiya."
2007 mein Upendra Yadav ko Amrika aane ke liye visa nahin mil raha tha. Ratanji se meri gupp hui phone par. Wo kahe ki sab kism ka prayas kiya gaya, kuchh phi kaam nahin kiya. Aap kuchh kariye hai to. Main apne ek DC ke dost ko contact kiya. Wo State ke South Asia desk officer ko janta tha.
New York Times: Free Ferry to U.S. Open: The 35-minute ferry ride, which can accommodate up to 149 passengers, will connect the East 35th Street and the World’s Fair marinas. .... Just to be clear, the fastest way to get to the tournament site from Manhattan is still the Long Island Railroad from Penn Station to the Mets-Willets Point station.Polarization Is Complete: Nepali Congress No Longer A Terai Party
ANTA Convention Program Details
1st ANTA Convention: September 24-25
Securing Federalism And Beyond For The Madhesi Cause
Polarization Is Complete: Nepali Congress No Longer A Terai Party
Image via WikipediaThe Nepali Congress launched its movements and revolutions over half a century with the Terai as its backbone of support. The Nepali Congress enjoyed power a few different times after 1990 because of the large number of votes it collected in the Terai. But now the Nepali Congress has become a purely Pahadi party.
Of the 25 elected to the NC central committee, and the 14 elected for the 14 zones are all Pahadi last names.
This is not a party that lost an election in the Terai and is now working hard to recapture its base in the Terai. This is a party that wants to go back to the good old days of the 1990s when it could ride roughshod on the Terai without worrying about losing its voter base. Those days are long gone.
Those elected under the open competition are:
Gagan Thapa - 2061
Arjun Narsingh K.C - 2024
Khum Bahadur Khadka - 1791
Shashank Koirala - 1769
Pradeep Giri - 1741
Sujata Koirala - 1739
Ram Chandra Poudel - 1703
Ram Sharan Mahat - 1699
Bal Krishna Khad- 1606
NP Saud - 1556
Shekhar Koirala - 1531
Mahesh Acharya - 1501
Minendra Rijal - 1435
Chandra Bhandari - 1369
Prakash Saran Mahat - 1386
Krishna Sitaula - 1373
Narayan Khadka - 1340
Bal Bahadur K.C - 1286
Gopal Man Shrestha - 1286
Purna Bahadur Khadka - 1246
Shankar Bhandari - 1215
Kul Bahadur Gurung - 1155
Manmohan Bhattarai - 1080
Gyanendra Bahadur Karki - 1068
Deep Kumar Upadhyaya - 1020
Those elected from the zones are:
Narendra Bikram Nemwang (Mechi)
Amod Prasad Upadhyaya (Koshi)
Ram Kumar Choudhary (Sagarmatha)
Nabindra Raj Joshi (Bagmati)
Anand Prasad Dhungana (Janakpur)
Ramesh Rijal (Narayani)
Surendra Pandey (Gandaki)
Krishna Chandra Nepali (Lumbini)
Arjun Joshi (Dhaulagiri)
Deepak Giri (Rapti)
Jeevan Bahadur Shahi (Karnali)
Kishor Singh Rathore (Bheri)
Badri Pandey (Seti)
Dilendra Prasad Badu (Mahakali)
The Nepali Congress got trounced in the Terai during the last election. Now it stands to get wiped out in the next.
And the ruling elite in Kathmandu are back to wanting to deprive the Teraiwasis of their basic voting rights.
Tuesday, September 21, 2010
ANTA Convention Program Details
Image by paramendra via Flickr
1 World's Fair Marina, Flushing, NY 11368
+ Take 7 train to 111th St
+ Head east on Roosevelt Ave toward 112th St
+ Turn left at 114th St
+ Turn right at 34th Ave
+ Turn left at Shea Rd
+ Slight left
+ Destination will be on the right
Give yourself 20 minutes for the full trip.
Short Route: Walk on 112th St towards Northern Blvd, Astoria Blvd. Go straight to convention center.
Or call someone with a car.
Presentation rules ..... ANTA is non-profit, non political organisation, please be sure not to bring or present any controversial matter during your presentation.ANTA 1st New York Convention : Conference Agenda
Start Date 9/24/10
Friday, September 24, 2010
- 4:00 pm to 6:00 pm Registration and Reception
- 7:00 pm to 9:00 pm Dinner : Local Restaurant See Dr. Binod Shah for Detail
- 8:45 pm to 9:00 pm Welcome Speech by Convention Committee Chair Dr. Binod Shah
- 9:00 pm to 10:00 pm ANTA Excom By_laws Amendment EXCOM Meeting
- Group Discussion Moderated by Jay Mandal, Mukesh Singh and Lalit Jha
Moderator: Dr Binod Shah
Morning Session 9:00 AM - 12:00 Noon
OPENING CEROMONY
- 9:00 to 9:15 am Opening Speech by Dr, Binod Shah, ANTA President
- 9:15 to 9:30 am NRN Prosective and Roles of Terians: Mr. Ratan Jha, NRNA General Sectratary
- 9:30 to 9:45 am ANTA, Madhesh and Nepal Dr Haribansh Jha
- 9:45 to 10:00 am Guest from UK
- 10:00 to 10:15 am Guest from India
- 10:00 to 10:30 am Special Guest : Mr. Ganesh Shah- Former Minister Environment, Science & Tech, Govt. of Nepal
- 10:30 am to 10:45 am Chief guest- H.E. Mr. Gyan Chandra Acharya, PR of Nepal at United Nations
- 10: 45 am to 11:00 am Aditya Jha : CEO of Karma Candy, Canada ANTA Honarary Member
- Moderator: Mukesh Singh
Pannel Discussion: ANTA – In retrospect and Prospect
ANTA Spokesperson
11:05 am to 11:55 am
Participents: Suman Timilsina
Dr Jay P Shah
Surendra Chaudhary
UK and India Participents, Guest particepents
AFTERNOON Session 1:00 to 5:00 PM
Moderator: Jay P Mandal ANTA YOUTH FORUM 1:00 pm to 2:00 pm
- 1:00 pm to 1:10 pm How much money you need to retire in USA in coming 30 yrs : Divita Mehta, Wall ST
- 1:10 pm to 1:20 pm A path and tips to become Doctor in USA Health Care System : Dr Biplav Yadav
- 1:20 pm to 1:30 pm Clean Energy and its uses to eliminate Proverty in Nepal: Lalit Mandal, PHD Student UNC
- 1:30 pm to 1:40 pm How to land Job in Wall ST: By Sunny Kantha , Morgan Stanly
- 1:40 pm to 1:50 pm Role of Social Media in business, life in Global and Terai Nepal : Paramendra Bagat
- 1:50 pm to 2:00 pm How USA Health Care System : Bisun Dev Mahto
- 2:00 pm to 2:15 pm Tea / Coffee Break
- 2:15 pm to 2:30 pm Ms Rekha Kantha
- 2:30 pm to 2:45 pm Mrs Sarala Singh
- 2:45 pm to 3:00 pm Mrs Seema Sah
- 3:00 pm to 3:15 pm Bishnu Pariyar
- 3:15 pm to 3:30 pm Rekha Karn
- 3:30 pm to 3:45 pm ANTA's roles in Empowerment, Development of Madhesh and Nepal: Lalit Jha ANTA Sr. VP
- 3:30 pm to 3:45 pm Collective investment an overview : RamKant Kharel, EntreprenuerLife Member ANTA
- 3:45 pm to 4:00 pm Natural Resources of Terai: Dr JP Shah, Professor Maimi International University
- 4:00 pm to 4:15 pm Federal Government - Promoting Finance, Tranperancy and Accountibility: Nawal Yadav
- 4:15 pm to 4:30 pm Why Tax Treaty is important with USA and Nepal for FDI in Nepal : Mukesh Singh
- 4:30 pm to 4:45 pm Terai Overview : Ram Manohar Sah
- 4:45 pm to 5:00 pm How Madhesh Can be Developed: Dr Sukhdev Shav, Economist
7:00 pm to 10:30 pm CLOSING & GALA Dinner CEROMONY
Evening Session
7:00 pm to 8 pm Dinner 8:00 pm to 8:15 pm Closing Speech & Award Ceromony by Dr. Binod Shah 8:15 pm to 8:30 pm New ANTA EXCOM 2010-2012 Announcement by Jay P Mandal 8:30 pm to 8:45 pm Thank you Notes by Amit Shah, NY Chapter President 8:45 to 10:30 pm Cultural Program
Competing With Hillary Now The First Time I Heard The Obama Name Claiming A Netroots/Grassroots Leadership Role With Iran Democracy Movement
Sunday, September 19, 2010
Friday, September 17, 2010
Indian Maoists
Image via WikipediaForeign Policy: Fire In The Hole: about 2,000 villagers who had been hiding behind the commando vanguard clambered over the fence into the compound and began emptying the magazine. Altogether they carried out 20 tons of explosives on their backs -- enough firepower to fuel a covert insurgency for a decade. ..... For years, the Maoists had lived in the shadow of India's breakneck modernization. Now they were thriving off it. ..... railing against what the rebels' spokesman described to us as the "evil consequences by the policies of liberalization, privatization, and globalization." ...... a full-fledged guerrilla war. Over the past 10 years, some 10,000 people have died and 150,000 more have been driven permanently from their homes by the fighting. ...... "Operation Green Hunt": a deployment of almost 100,000 new paramilitary troops and police to contain the estimated 7,000 rebels and their 20,000-plus -- according to our research -- part-time supporters. ..... a country 20 years into an experiment in rapid, technology-driven development, one of globalization's most celebrated success stories. ....... Today, India's GDP is more than five times what it was in 1991..... Economic liberalization has not even nudged the lives of the country's bottom 200 million people. ...... India's vast hinterland remains dirt poor -- nowhere more so than the mining region of India's eastern interior, the part of the country that produces the iron for the buildings and cars, the coal that keeps the lights on in faraway metropolises, and the exotic minerals that go into everything from wind turbines to electric cars to iPads. ...... If you were to lay a map of today's Maoist insurgency over a map of the mining activity powering India's boom, the two would line up almost perfectly. ..... Revenues from mineral extraction in Chhattisgarh and Jharkhand topped $20 billion in 2008, and more than $1 trillion in proven reserves still sit in the ground. ...... foreign investment in the country has grown to 150 times what it was in 1991. ....... some $80 billion worth of projects are stalled at least in part by the guerrilla war, enough to double India's steel output. ...... ining companies have managed to double their production in the two states in the past decade, even as the conflict has escalated; the most unscrupulous among them have used the fog of war as a pretext for land grabs, leveling villages whose residents have fled the fighting. At the same time, the Maoists, for all their communist rhetoric, have become as much a business as anything else ...... Shimmering waves of heat, thick with carbon monoxide and selenium, waft through jagged cracks in the pavement large enough to swallow a soccer ball. A hundred feet below, a massive subterranean coal fire, started in an abandoned mine, burns so hot that it melts the soles of one's shoes. ....... this blaze could easily smolder for another 200 years before the coal seam is finally burned through. ...... A fire ignited in 1916 by neglectful miners near the city of Jharia has grown so large that it now threatens to burn away the land beneath the entire community, plunging the 400,000 residents into an underground inferno. ...... statehood only enabled the rise of a new cast of villains. ...... The guerrillas shun email and mobile phones and rarely communicate with the world beyond the jungle, mostly via letters ferried back and forth by foot soldiers. Over several years of attempted correspondence, we received only a few missives in return. All were written in an opaque style full of the sort of arcane Marxist jargon that the rest of the world forgot in the 1970s. ......... many of their local commanders appear to be in it for the money alone. ...... "The only way to stop the attacks is to negotiate." ...... a state where less than half of raw materials are extracted legitimately. ..... The protection money, like the small bribes Kumar says he pays to the police to avoid troublesome safety and environmental regulations, has simply become another operating cost. ...... "If you want to be somebody in Jharkhand, just kill an aid worker" ...... Salwa Judum, secretly assembled by the Chhattisgarh government in 2005 to fight the Maoists; its 5,000-odd members patrol the state armed with everything from AK-47s to axes. Some roam the forest with bows and arrows. ..... After leftist author Arundhati Roy paid a visit to the Maoists this year, the Indian government reinterpreted its anti-terrorism laws to make speaking favorably about the rebels or their ideological aims -- including opposition to corporate mining -- punishable by up to 10 years in prison. ...... mistaking industrialization for development -- by thinking that it could launch its economy into the 21st century without modernizing its political structures and justice system along with it, or preventing the corruption that worsens the inequality that development aid from New Delhi is supposed to rectify.
The Economist: Nepal, China And India: Rivals On The Roof Of The World: Great-Power Rivalry Grows In The Himalayas: China has played a low-key role in Nepal until recently. But the emergence of the Maoists as the largest party has shifted the balance, with India becoming more closely aligned with the anti-Maoist faction. The prime minister, Madhav Kumar Nepal, says India’s government distrusts them and wants the party to make sweeping changes to its organisation and beliefs. .... one MP said his daughter stood to lose her scholarship in India if he voted Maoist. ...... Senior staff at the country’s largest newspaper group, which Indian diplomats think hostile to their country, say they have been unable to get newsprint through India and that Indian companies have been asked to withdraw advertising. .....politicians of all stripes think India is trying to micro-manage Nepal and anti-Indian sentiment runs high. Indian diplomats “swagger around like viceroys” .... the ceasefire is looking ever more threadbare .....Being sandwiched between two giants might seem promising for a poor country. With skill, Nepal could play one off against the other. Instead, with peace in the balance and fears growing that both neighbours are vying to pick the next prime minister, Nepal risks being ground between their vaulting regional ambitions.
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