In your interview with Badri P Shrestha (There is enough money to finance development #127) the finance minister brags correctly about his ability to direct scarce resources of the poverty-stricken government which he inherited towards development. His emphasis on bailing out the dying tourism industry is also commendable. However, let it not be an example of robbing Peter to pay Paul (Nepali version: sadhu lai suli, chor lai chautara). What goes on in the netherworld of Nepali industry and finance should be no secret to Shrestha. Doctored balance sheets to raise capital, insider trading, collusion with the regulating authority in bank-rate fixing, inflated cost estimates for bank financing, conflict of interest lending resulting in bad loans?these are all accepted as au natural. The finance minister should take the advice of the CIAA before injecting the hard-earned earnings of Nepali overseas workers to bail out their robber barons.

Privatisation is a fashionable word, but only if the private sector is not a bunch of crooks like it is in Nepal. Let a thousand flowers bloom, but let us learn to distinguish between who is a flower and who is a weed. So, before rescuing the tourism industry, please try to make sure you are not rescuing the swindlers. Badri, like Arjun in the Gita, should shed his emotion and attachment and be ready to slay even kith and kin to clean up the country. Corruption rests on four pillars: collusion, connivance, cronyism and connection. The Surya Nath and the Lamsal commissions should not stop at ministers, they should scrutinise our private crooks as well.

Gaja Raj,
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