Looking back, moving on

Editorial
Looking back, moving on

FROM ISSUE #534 (31 DEC 2010 - 06 JAN 2011) | TABLE OF CONTENTS

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KIRAN PANDAY

Whatever you are doing on new year's eve, if you look back honestly on 2010, it's hard to miss a sense of collective failure as a nation. The year has been marked by political wrangling above all else, and the extension of the Constituent Assembly has not, to date, advanced the cause of the constitution to come. If there was hope that the political parties were close to reaching an agreement on power-sharing, the constitution, and integration of the Maoist ex-combatants, the latter's Palungtar plenum has dampened it. It appears we are back to square one, and Girija Prasad Koirala, for all his faults, is missed sorely in the attempts to forge the consensus that is needed to move on.

2010 had more than its fair share of scandals, high-profile assassinations, air and road accidents, and natural disasters. There was plenty that was bad and ugly. But there was some good, too, that owed much to initiatives led by remarkable Nepalis. Anuradha Koirala became CNN Hero of the Year for her work with Maiti Nepal. Shrikrishna Upadhyay won the Right Livelihoods Award for his work with SAPPROS. Against all odds, Nepal's women cricket and football teams continued to shine.

More quality books were published, movies made, and music released than ever before, and 2010 morphed into a year for festivals � jazz, blues, theatre, the environment, the arts, poetry � that underlined the creative potential of Nepalis. If nothing else, we can look forward to more of the same next year.

There is a justifiable tendency for some to dismiss such achievements as irrelevant in the face of the daunting challenges Nepal faces in concluding the peace process and drafting a constitution that will set up a level playing field for all the peoples of this nation. But if we are to meet these collective challenges, and spur those making decisions on our behalf to do so, then individual and social endeavour of this sort serves to demonstrate that if only we put our minds to it, anything is possible.

It's not about replicating Kathmandu's cultural and social ferment elsewhere. If we didn't know already, Elinor Ostrom, winner of the Nobel Memorial Prize for Economic Sciences, visited Nepal this year and reiterated the capacity of rural Nepali communities to manage their resources efficiently and equitably. The capital enjoys its own advantages. If we manage to facilitate the same in towns and villages across the country (and document what is already happening), then 2011 is certainly worth looking forward to.

1. Slarti
There is a justifiable tendency for some to dismiss such achievements as irrelevant in the face of the daunting challenges Nepal faces in concluding the peace process and drafting a constitution that will set up a level playing field for all the peoples of this nation.

Those achievements are not irrelevant. They are different and removed from the urgent and pressing matters in which both Nepali politicians and the media have failed.

The achievements that you mention are individual accomplishments in a particular field, and these individuals need to be praised. The challenges facing this country are far more serious than that and it is your duty to be more truthful and assertive in your editorials, at least.

As a leading media organisation you do not have the luxury of being a part of any party or political line's propaganda mouth piece. You also do not have the luxury of accepting some conclusions as foregone, you cannot accept a political line as sacrosanct. Read Ostrom's interview again, check data from the NRB, compare conclusions, check economies with parallels with Nepal, you will find interesting things.

Have a look at the reality, go out and find out what is everywhere but you, the elite of this country, choose to ignore. The real narrative for Nepal is far richer and far more interesting than you appear to think and seem to convey.

Please, please, please, Kunda Dixit appears to be a nice and caring person with a sense of humour, surely, certainly, he can do better than this, he can do better than a photgraphy exhibition.

This is the time for truth, make you promise to yourself that you would stand up for this in 2011, no matter how uncomfortably you feel about it.

Try and contemplate on this little thing that bothers me. The only place that I belong is this, when it ends at the hands of some of the worst politicians that the world has ever seen, nothing, no one, will ever be able to resurrect what we have lost, ever. Neither will anybody forget that loss.

Israel came back after 2000 years, it is still looking for peace.

Posted on: 31 DEC 2010 | 8:01 PM NST

2. Arthur
"It's not about replicating Kathmandu's cultural and social ferment elsewhere."

Isn't there more cultural and social ferment in the Terai and the hills than in Kathmandu?

Posted on: 31 DEC 2010 | 10:36 PM NST

3. K. K. Sharma

Thanks for this laugh as a new year gift. You say:

" But if we are to meet these collective challenges, and spur those making decisions on our behalf to do so, then individual and social endeavour of this sort serves to demonstrate that if only we put our minds to it, anything is possible."

You, like many Nepali intellectuals, still thinking that the incompetents will be capable of delivering, if you spur them on..... Ha ha .. The incompetents delivering !! That will be the day. !!!

Posted on: 31 DEC 2010 | 11:06 PM NST

4. who cares
1. Slarti,

the truths for your consumption:

1: gyn bahadur is the reincarnation of lord vishnu.

2: he can do no wrong, he is intelligent, who do not give a dam about money, power.

3: he had right to take over power.

4: his take over was so successful, nepalese got all the happiness, peace they had dreamed of.

5: his son is the most descent, intelligent person in nepal.

happy now.

Posted on: 01 JAN 2011 | 1:35 PM NST

5. Slarti
Absolutely, Who Cares, you are the future of all Nepal, radiating with brilliance of a diamond, sharp as the edge of a Khukuri....Now place it in your back.

Posted on: 01 JAN 2011 | 2:22 PM NST

6. who cares
slarti,

"Now place it in your back."

thanks, but not just me, but all republicans should place it on our back pointing away from us.

Posted on: 01 JAN 2011 | 3:08 PM NST

7. Rip Van Winkle
Rabi Thapa is the editorof NT but to some readers Kunda Dixit is still the Editor!

Posted on: 02 JAN 2011 | 6:32 AM NST