Of the many opportunities that Nepal is wasting, like its unnatural resources and our vast store of inhuman capital, none is more glaring than the way we have squandered every opportunity to be an international educational hub.
We have a lot we can teach the world, and after all, the present world could do with some improvement. So, it is the responsibility of each and everyone of us to kill two birds with one stone, since a bird in the hand is worth two in a Swiss bank account. Being a country of dollar millionaires who are now rubbing shoulders with the world’s most prestigious arms dealers, smugglers and money laundromats, it behooves us to share our expertise in corporate fraud and malfeasance at the upper echelons of government with the world out there.
It is clear that our existing institutes of higher learning, which are steeped in old-fashioned values like ethics, integrity, hard work, do not prepare young Nepalis to survive in the rough-and-tumble world of todfod, bandfand, kutakut, lutpat, and last but not least, chorchar. We need new institutions of higher learning that move with the times to teach students to be street smart so they get vocational training in burning tyres, vandalising shops and cremating motrocycles in order to stop a vote in parliament.
This is why it is heartening to note that the region’s first School for Scoundrels (affiliated to the Charlatan Heston University in Texas, USA) has just opened its gates to all wannabe crooks desirous of pursuing higher studies in hooliganism. Everyone wants to be a ruffian these days, so competition is stiff. But the institute has a strict screening policy that shortlists only the scum of the earth, and from that group carefully selects outstandingly evil geniuses with a demonstrated potential for lawless behaviour who will be eligible for scholarships. Seats are limited, however, so only those who can threaten and/or bribe the registrar will gain admission.
Once accepted, freshers immediately get down to serious academics with a special undergraduate curriculum for young thugs that prepares them for a rigorous four-year graduate degree course under a special Rascals-in-Residence program. This is followed by an interdisciplinary immersion course in pursuance of a Doctorate in Dacoitry. Then, and only then, can we truly say that we have separated the chaff from the wheat and begin teaching future crooks how to make lots of dough.
Once graduated, students will have to do a compulsory one-year internship in a hotbed of corruption of their choice to garner practical experience in white-collar crime.
Full descriptions of the courses offered at the University of Banditry School for Rogues and Scalawags may be found under the following appropriate disciplines:
Introductory Course for Smugglers
Course guide: Prof Dr Tusker
Semester: Fall
Level: Intermediate
Nepal has an open border with India that is under-utilised, leading to an alarming drop in informal bilateral trade. This course allows students to explore creative new ways to go to-and-fro across the border and line up tremendous job opportunities along no-man’s-land. Students can specialise in the illicit trade in tiger spare parts, weapons import and export, counterfeit currency, girl trafficking and crossborder goon renting.
Extortion as a Force in Nation-Building Practicum
Faculty Supervisor: Comrade Johnny Cash
Semester: Fall
Level: Junior
This course offers students an extensive and intensive on-the-job internship with the Dash Baddies in all kinds of extortion, including purloining, kidnapping for ransom, graft, and blackmail. It is also an expensive course, which in itself is an illustration of extortion. Partial scholarships available for deserving candidates who have experience sabotaging transmission lines and holding hydropower projects to ransom. Free firearms training for early bird applicants.
Unaccountability:
How to How to Plunder the Public in Public
Adjutant Professor: Dean Con Man, PhD
Semester: Year
Level: Advanced
The theory of wealth transfer from the poor in rich countries to the rich in poor countries. Essentials of behaviour dynamics that makes people willingly hand over all their savings to a complete stranger. Is greed hereditary? Are atheists more corrupt? Advanced course in amassing ill-gotten wealth by stealing the allowances of ex-guerrillas.