Nepali Times
INDU NEPAL
Politically Cracked
United we fall


INDU NEPAL


Once upon a time in a kingdom far away lived a generous king. One day, a sage presented him with a chessboard as a gift. The king had never seen such a thing and offered the wise man a reward of his choice. The sage asked for a grain of rice on the first square of the chessboard, two on the second, four on the third and so on, doubling the amount each time. The king, frankly insulted for having been asked for what he thought was a meagre amount, quickly agreed only to realise that he would fail to grant the sage his reward. It would have come to 18,446,744,073,709,551,615 grains of rice (roughly 62 billion metric tonnes), many times more than what the arable land on Earth can produce.

This is because of the power of exponential numbers, which is the principle by which networking businesses like Unity Life-Assurance International (which has finally been closed down) operate. They will tell you can earn money by recruiting new members to the company, but not that there are not enough people on the planet for everyone participating in such a venture to profit.

The formula was not invented yesterday, but it seems too much to expect our leaders to understand it. Therefore, they did what the complacent king would have done.

President Ram Baran Yadav presented a letter of appreciation to the head of Unity Life-Assurance International. Prime Minister Madhav Kumar Nepal presented garlands. Foreign Minister Sujata Koirala wrote a letter of recommendation hoping Unity would make its business delivery more efficient. The Minster of Commerce Rajendra Mahato lauded the creative way in which Unity was operating. Maoist politburo member Lil Bahadur Thapa said a Maoist government would adopt Unity's 'nation-building strategy' into the national five-year plan and enlist 10 million Maoist supporters as Unity members.

The masterminds behind this Ponzi scheme plastered these recommendations onto a glossy newsletter next to images of skyscrapers so they could present the package to hapless villagers, menial workers and daily wage labourers, some of whom sold their belongings and took high-interest loans to become members.

Unity sold dreams. It said it had plans to buy 300 Boeing 747s. It was going to make Nepal fuel-independent within ten years by juicing Jatropha berries. It was going to utilise the 'wasted' hydro potential of Nepal to produce 7,000 MW of electricity. "You can join us today to earn these benefits or five years later. We are going to run the country," a Unity representative told a housewife in Pokhara. "And we have endorsements from all these leaders to prove it."

For four years, while Unity duped 650,000 people into giving up almost 10 billion of their hard-earned rupees, no one bothered to check if it had the required paperwork to conduct any of these businesses. There are no regulations for networking business, they said, but what about the banking and insurance plans it was selling? If our leaders found it too difficult to understand how a Ponzi scheme works, they should have just tried the alternative, and simpler, strategy of not endorsing a business running illegally.

Networking businesses are not based on the value of the company; they feed off the value of the relationships that sell such schemes. Unity milked the trust between friends, neighbours and relatives. After banning network businesses this week, the government has said that it will prosecute Unity honchos. But in endorsing the company, government ministers and political leaders are already accomplices to their malicious deceit and should be held responsible for it.

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1. koji
Great article. Basically it is an ancient story of greed retold. There is no such thing as a free lunch but it is a lesson that humans don't seem to be able to learn. If only people had such greed for equitable development...

2. Akanchhya Gurung
Excellent and eye opening article for our Corrupt Leaders and Corrupt Politicians.Hats off to the writer!!!!

3. npaso
the story is not that unity existed or looted people, the story should be where was law enforcement when unity was openly raising all this money from innocent population all over the country. did it not occur to any of them to check their operating license?


4. tesroankha
Great article. This is called analysis. Unbiased-balanced-credible views backed up by accurate facts. I hope all our other so called 'analysts' read it. Great job indu ji


5. Concerned Citizen
It seems Nepali financial entrepreneurs  have 'learned' and 'imported' these esoteric fancy ideas and practices from overseas, like we do many other things including 'religion', 'human rights' or even 'democracy' from outside! Afterall, Berny Maddof operated similar ponzi schemes in the US. The guy is in jail, however, hundreds, if not thousands of veterans, ordinary citizens, the retired elderly people or even institutions lost their life-time savings. Lesson learned- do not blindly copy others! Does corporate capitalism has moral and ethical responsibility? Or the logic goes-- It is too-big to fail? The mantra is trust but also check! Our country definitely needs better oversight. However, sincere and honest oversight comes only with insight and foresight. The current establishment has utterly failed to carry out its responsibility. Should it not be accountable to the people?


6. Pooja

Article likes this one is why I read the Nepali Times. Good job!



7. A.K.
Great Article with unbiased, broad and straight views...!!! Very well written article. Good job!!!

8. G
Would it have saved a lot of people from financial distress if similar article(s) had been published a few years ago ?
Where were the journalists and the media during the four years while the 650,000 were being duped ??



9. Sargam
In a chessboard there are 64 cases. Hence, 2 to the power 64 is that gigantic cypher of sum up. Very thoughtful article. Berny Maddof  cheated on the people for decades with this ponzy system.

 Now, for a fun sake, make addition of 1 to 100, how much...? (only in 3 seconds). Answer is (1+100) = 101x50 =5050. All in formula!?!


10. Unknown

Not taking anything away from  your good write-up, I was just curious how you got your total number of grains. I tried to do the math and came up with a similar number but not the same one. Just curious how you got the number you quote. My number comes out to be:

18446744073709600000

While your point it taken, I just wanted to make sure my calculations are correct. Your last digit '5' was a red flag



11. suman
The interesting part is about the leaders and how they are so easy to dupe.  They are so shallow.  Also, leaders of their statures should not be running around after the BabaJi like Ramdev who makes outlandish claim about curing all diseases on the planet with his simple remedy.  Yet, no one dares to  challenge him for proof.  This kind of blind mentality being set by the top leaders will never help the masses to be critical about thing.  


12. jange
# 8 There was a similar case a few years ago and Himal had some good articles explaining it all. Maybe others did too.

It is basically a question of being blinded by greed which prevents people from seeing the logic of it.


13. S B Bisht
this is one of the best articles i have read in this news magazine. there is a moral to be learned here. it takes a lot of hard and honest work to prosper. there is no substitute. there is no shortcut. unless you are thinking to dupe unsuspecting people.


14. Arthur
Unknown #10,
(2^64) - 1 = 1.84467441 × 1019(via google search).

Yours has more significant figures. The article and wikipedia have the same result, with ALL significant figures.

The odd digit 5 at the end of the correct result is from subtracting 1 from an even number. It is not a "red flag".

The zeroes at the end of your result indicates that the calculator you used truncated the result to the number of significant digits it could handle (as did the calculator in google search box).

If you add 1 grain to the first square and then move the two grains now on the first square to become 4 (instead of two) on the second square, and keep going like this moving each square to the next one (which has the same number, so doubling it each time), you will end up with 2^63 grains on the second last square as well as the last square. So there are 2 x 2^63 = 2^64 now all in one square. Then take away the extra 1 grain you added.



15. Bimal Ghimire
The deception is not only done by Unity but also by our leaders including President and PM. Many poeple built trust over Unity when they saw our officials and leaders attending and speaking in favor of the company. Unity must have greesed their palm well and shut their mouth. All those key officials and leaders must explain Nepali people and apologige for thier mistake.  

16. bk singh
Political marketing cause poor more poorer

17. AP
Good article.. 

LATEST ISSUE
638
(11 JAN 2013 - 17 JAN 2013)


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