<figure><img width="4032" height="3024" src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221114111144/63721cce9c7e80680e0bd4aejpeg.jpg" alt=""/><figcaption>Photo: SOFILA VAIDYA</figcaption></figure>Felicity Volk is Australia’s ambassador to Nepal, but many may not know that she is also a novelist. Long before joining Australia's Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade (DFAT), Volk had grown up with writer parents who sparked an interest for writing from her early years. “They were the voices in my childhood ear that called my own words into being and initiated me into the infinite possibility of imagination,” recalls Volk. When she was seven, her parents spent a year travelling through Europe in a Bedford campervan with the family. They made stops at galleries, and in one Volk remembers seeing the paintings of Pieter Bruegel the Elder. Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/opinion/schools-of-the-air/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Schools of the Air</a>, Felicity Volk The young girl was struck by the way one canvas could carry so many stories, and everywhere in a Bruegel frame was an unfolding world, interconnected, but also complete in itself, a visual novel of sorts. “The stories I want to tell have a similar ambition,” adds Volk, who went on to study English literature at the University of Queensland while continuing to write short stories and poetry. Next, she set off to Canberra to begin her diplomatic career and before long, she was consumed with the demands of her new job that left little time for anything else. It was only after postings in Bangladesh and Laos, and the birth of her daughters that Volk rediscovered writing. A screenplay led to short stories, to novellas, to two novels, Lightning (2013) and Desire Lines (2020). Read more: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/here-now/nepals-women-envoys-make-a-mark/">Nepal's women envoys make a mark</a>, Pratistha Rijal “The juggle of my two professional lives is hard, but the compulsion to write is elemental,” Volk explains. “I write, as American writer Joan Didion so eloquently described it, ‘to find out what I'm thinking, what I'm looking at, what I see and what it means. What I want and what I fear’.” Extensive travel as a diplomat has allowed the author in Volk to explore what it is like to be an outsider in someone else’s land and even a stranger in one’s own life. Grief, identity, alienation and connection are common themes in Volk’s novels and so is the question whether we are responsible for our circumstances, or if fate is pre-determined. She often brings in her personal experience in her work, of loss, betrayal and pain, compassion, towards self and others. As ambassador, Volk is so busy that the most she can manage to keep her writing muscle exercised is the occasional poem. This week, for example, she was in Lumbini to attend a cricket match paying tribute to legendary Australian bowler Shane Warne. Volk was appointed ambassador to Nepal during the pandemic, which has largely shaped her tenure. Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/here-now/her-excellencies/">Her Excellencies</a>, Sanghamitra Subba “Covid-19 made for a very stop-start experience of settling into my role as ambassador and getting to know Nepal,” she says. “The opportunities that are now available, to travel to remote parts of the country, to connect, to discover what people look like unmasked, to explore Kathmandu, are even more precious as a result.” Australia itself has reopened its borders. Nepal has resumed sending its students down under and is expected to reach the pre-pandemic peak of 50,000 a year soon. Nepali students account for 8% of total international pupils in Australian universities. Over 200,000 Nepalis are settled in Australia. It has been 62 years since the two countries established diplomatic relations and during that time, Australia has supported Nepal through some of its best success stories, including its community forestry program credited for doubling the country’s forest cover in just two decades. In recent times, Australian aid and support have been primarily for subnational governance, gender equality including women’s political participation, climate resilience and Covid recovery. Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/here-now/the-alchemy-of-angst/">The Alchemy of Angst</a>, Elif ShafakWe ask Felicity Volk if her travels in Nepal have inspired her to write another novel. One is indeed underway, even though the manuscript is languishing. In the meantime, she is also gathering information for a story set in Nepal woven with its magic and mysticism.At 56, Volk is in her 33rd year as a diplomat. Before coming to Nepal as an ambassador, she had been here several times as a tourist and last year, her daughters visited Nepal for the first time.Says Volk: “I loved exploring Nepal with the girls, seeing the country through their first-time eyes, but most of all, I relished sitting by a fire in my residence with them, eating, drinking and playing cards. That was when my house in Kathmandu became a home.”  <img width="384" height="500" src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221114111144/63721cd19c7e80680e0bd4afjpeg.jpg" alt="">Read more: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/review/for-children-about-children/">For children, about children</a>, Ashish Dhakal

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Australia’s writing diplomat

Here is a directory of 50 women from different walks in life in Nepal, a collaborative work by Bec Ordish, Sarita Gurung and Nimdiki Sherpa-Ordish, with photos by Jessica Amity. 50 Women from Nepal comes with the claim to ‘change the way you see the world’, and it might if you give this book a chance.The authors ask six questions on repeat to 50 women from public and private spheres, some known names and some now known, and many of whom have been profiled in this newspaper over the years.The questions range from what matters, to their inspirations to the one word that matters, and in answering those six questions, the lives of these 50 Nepali women unfold before us.Kalpana Pradhan is a mother, and to her being a mother matters the most. Self-educated, she has written over forty children’s books in Nepali. But the life of a writer came to her by fluke when she started writing stories for her own children, none of them written with the intent of a public eye.The word ‘mother’ is uttered when we hurt, feel surprise or dismay. The term is loaded because of women like Pradhan, who fence their children from the world at crowded fetes in Pashupati.  We also know this from Pratikshya Pradhan Joshi, who, as a teacher of Nepali, allows her students to sing and converse and get noisy in their classrooms as they learn, instead of disciplining them— variations of motherhood.But motherhood is sometimes akin to sisterhood. Gita Rasaili has spent her life dedicating it to fighting for justice for those affected during Nepal’s conflict. Her sister was sexually tortured and killed and as a child soldier herself, she has seen the darkest sides of war.“My family’s grief changed the direction of my life. It led me to search for answers,” she says in the book.If ‘voice’ is the most outstanding term for Rasaili, ‘patience’ is what defines Shila Thapa who has devoted herself to caring for children with <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/opinion/changing-disability-to-this-ability/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Down Syndrome</a>, beginning from her own son.“My biggest fear is what will happen to people with Down Syndrome when their main caregivers die or leave them,” which is what propelled her to set up the Satyam Day Care Centre. She believes everything can be won with patience.<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221110111152/636cd7dd9c7e80680e092e0cjpeg.jpg" alt="" width="517" height="697"/>But for some women, it takes more than that. It needs determination. When Sarita Shrestha was turned down by an ayurvedic college saying the course was too rigorous for girls, it only made her more determined. She made sure she would become the first woman in Nepal to have a Doctor of Medicine in Ayurveda. She has toured the world over the years, teaching ayurvedic gynecology, bringing relief to many women going through childbirth.Dev Kumari Das challenged the tradition of <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/child-marriage-in-nepal-eloped-at-13-mother-by-17/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">child marriage</a> in her community and has since led a turbulent yet fierce life, even having to physically defend herself against those who do not agree with her. She was literally chained to keep her from fighting against child marriage – a career path that is only rewarded every time she protects a girl from early marriage.<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221110111152/636cd7df9c7e80680e092e0djpeg.jpg" alt="" width="535" height="685">Then there is Ranju Darshana, raised by a single mother she saw <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/women-leaders-seen-but-not-heard/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">politics</a> as the game that would allow her to steer change, a rare career for someone with no oligarchy as backing. A few pages away from her is journalist/mountaineer/comedian <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/Nepali-Times-Buzz/Shailee-top-world,3947" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Shailee Basnet</a>—laughing the world off in glee.“Money makes me happy,” she says, recounting tales of days when she had no money despite her fame for climbing Everest and seven peaks in seven continents. And this simple, honest statement moves the reader. “When I was a child, without the opportunity to play and explore, I would tell myself that when I grew up and earned money, when I didn’t need permission from anybody, then I would play,” Basnet says. And she has been doing just that.If Basnet’s infectious laughter lingers with you, so will Charimaya Tamang’s pensive eyes as she watches back with her life’s hardships. Hers is probably the hardest story to read in the book,  being trafficked into a brothel in India, rescued back to Nepal, and setting up Shakti Samuha which has helped so many <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/the-steadfastness-of-a-long-distance-runner/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">trafficked women</a>.The book, heavy in your hands, will keep you going as you read about how Ananda Shova Tamrakar has gone on to make vermi-composting a lucrative business, as well as a gift for those around her. To read <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/interview/a-woman-is-as-capable-sushila-karki,3375" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">former Chief Justice Sushila Karki</a> talk about integrity, frugality and the importance of women supporting other women, offer some of the greatest nuggets of wisdom.The book displays sisterhood in women like Shubhangi and Jesslina Rana, two young entrepreneurs who started the Pad2go campaign to support <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/editorial/that-time-of-the-month/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">menstrual hygiene</a>. Then there is the story of Stuti Thapa, who has hired women to make cloth bags, managing to displace plastic bags from major stores.A farmer’s daughter, Jhuna Tamang, who set up tea farms and employed others, says tea brings people together in sad and happy times. There is memory of poverty in the book, just as there is the story of perseverance—of women like Goma Koirala who has lost family members to poverty and pain, but has not given up raising a granddaughter alone. And there is the courage of Laxmi Ghalan, one of the first openly lesbian women in Nepal.<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221110111152/636cd7e19c7e80680e092e0ejpeg.jpg" alt="" width="532" height="512">The stories that have been curated, range from that of the famous actress Karishma Manandhar to <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/sangita-magar-from-survivor-to-champion/" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Sangita Magar</a>, who calls herself a “survivor” after her experience of having been through an acid attack.In the lives of women featured in the book, who are players, artists, writers, actors, activists, teachers, entrepreneurs, industrialists, doctors, agriculturalists, climbers, journalists, politicians, pilots, you will see acumen, courage and compassion as they bare their lives before us so we can make ours.Based on interviews that were transcribed and translated from different languages by a group of women, this is a book by women about women. The book has a very development document feel with its glossy, heavy pages, modeled after the international 200 Women: Who Will Change the Way You See the World. But the texture also gives the portraits the effect it is expected to have on the reader.Seeing women in control of their skills and lives is what makes us realise that independence matters. Each woman’s life in itself is actually a saga of the many lives she leads to evolve into the person she is constantly trying to become.<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221110111152/636cd7e39c7e80680e092e0fjpeg.jpg" alt="" width="105" height="200">

Pratibha Tuladhar

50 outstanding women of Nepal

It is a privilege to be able to read, understand and appreciate the depth of women’s writing and the expanse of their ideas. But it was several years before I would understand the bias against women’s writing— and in extension, their characters. A popular bookstore raised an outcry when it shared how men are quick to admit they do not read books by women, and research revealed a price disparity in men’s and women’s books of up to 45 %.<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221110111148/636cd7979c7e80680e092deajpeg.jpg" alt="" width="126" height="150"/>It is not only dry data. In conversation, male acquaintances are quick to defend themselves and say they read and like books by women. Yet, why is it that their book recommendations and references are dominated by men, and names of women do not flow from the tongue as smoothly as the men’s?We never feel the need to categorise men’s writing, but how quickly books by women are tied to the limitations of ‘romance’, ‘feminist’, or ‘women-centric.’So often, women’s writing is casually dismissed as confessional and emotional, as though it were not the most difficult thing in the world to be honest and arouse feelings – which is only a fraction of what writing by women achieves. While ‘women’s writing’ is itself a term fraught with several connotations, not all of them appreciative, it has become more crucial than ever to read, talk about, widely share and appreciate the fabulous works of these writers.<a style="font-size: 15px; letter-spacing: 0.01em;" href="https://www.amazon.com/Vindication-Rights-Woman-Thrift-Editions/dp/0486290360" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">A Vindication of the Rights of Woman</a>, Mary Wollstonecraft“I do not wish (women) to have power over men; but over themselves,” said Wollstonecraft 230 years ago. When I read this piece, I was astounded at how fiercely a woman had rebelled during such oppressive times, and saddened by how little has changed in the lives of women. It is the collective voice of an entire generation, fueled by the accumulated rage of several centuries. While some ideas in the essay seem misogynistic today, Wollstonecraft’s powerful roar still resonates within many of us. This angst with the world is also duplicated in The Bell Jar by Sylvia Plath, while Chimamanda Adichie harnesses Wollstonecraft’s urgent call for transformation in her treatise ‘We Should All Be Feminists.’<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221110111148/636cd7989c7e80680e092debjpeg.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="459"><img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221110111148/636cd7999c7e80680e092decjpeg.jpg" alt="" width="400" height="607"><a style="font-size: 15px; letter-spacing: 0.01em;" href="https://www.amazon.com/Beloved-Toni-Morrison/dp/1400033411" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Beloved</a>,Toni MorrisonIt is difficult to decide what is more touching in Beloved - style or content. It is an anguish against racism and rage against lopsided history, told through the unforgettable story of a family of slaves. It is also a story of strong mothers and stronger daughters who leave their dreams, voyages and poetry scattered on each page. It is traumatic in content and enviable in style, just like Yaa Gyasi’s Homegoing, published more recently in 2016.<a style="font-size: 15px; letter-spacing: 0.01em;" href="https://www.amazon.in/Unbound-Years-Indian-Womens-Writing/dp/9382277668" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Unbound: 2,000 Years of Indian Women’s Writing</a>, Anne ZaidiAnne Zaidi has done the unthinkable with this volume that attempts to capture two millennia of women’s writing in the vast literary world of India. Rather than consider it an all-exhaustive anthology, Zaidi thoughtfully terms it a tribute to the sisterhood that wrote steadfastly amidst all odds, and was rarely given space in major literary collections. This is a prototype, a diverse read and a labor of love that other countries would do well to follow.<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221110111148/636cd79a9c7e80680e092dedjpeg.jpg" alt="" width="640" height="943"><img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221110111148/636cd79d9c7e80680e092deejpeg.jpg" alt="" width="264" height="419"><a style="font-size: 15px; letter-spacing: 0.01em;" href="https://www.amazon.com/Kim-Jiyoung-Born-1982-Nam-Joo-ebook/dp/B07LFL9V9Z" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Kim Jiyoung, Born 1982</a>,Cho Nam-JooWhy are women so angry all the time, a lot of men like to ask. Why have women become so ‘radical’ and ‘fierce’? Kim Jiyoung, now nearly 40 years old, will tell you why. As she navigates childhood, adolescence, marriage and childbirth, she talks artlessly but passionately of the injustices she and her sisters undergo each day. This is the book that abetted the #MeToo movement in Korea, and resonated with millions of women around the world who felt the writer was recounting their own memoir.<a style="font-size: 15px; letter-spacing: 0.01em;" href="https://www.amazon.com/All-us-our-own-lives/dp/9382277374" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">All of Us in Our Own Lives</a>,Manjushree ThapaThis is an ordinary tale of normal people connecting with each other in unexpected ways – but it contains a tiny microcosm of Nepal within itself. All the characters that we watch on television or read about in papers or write a case study about, Thapa manages to bring into the same story. The novel is a critical analysis of Nepal as a failed state, a farce on its development aid, a study of its exclusionary norms and practices, and a celebration of the ordinary joys of life amongst this wretchedness. It is Nepal as we know, love, and hate.<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221110111148/636cd79e9c7e80680e092defjpeg.jpg" alt="" width="318" height="475"><img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221110111148/636cd7a09c7e80680e092df0jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="332" height="500"><a style="font-size: 15px; letter-spacing: 0.01em;" href="https://www.amazon.com/Difficult-Women-Roxane-Gay/dp/1543622941" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Difficult Women</a>, Roxane GayRoxane Gay writes stories, but they are not imaginary – they are as true as our lives. In Difficult Women, she brings together all those women that society finds tiresome or troublesome. These women might crave money and power, or nurse a kink, or worship their bodies. They are all given a safe space, they are all lent voices to speak up. Read this to experience the convergence of the most unapologetic and ferocious women in your lives, which might include yourself.<a style="font-size: 15px; letter-spacing: 0.01em;" href="https://www.amazon.com/Wild-Swans-Three-Daughters-China/dp/0743246985" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Wild Swans: Three Daughters of China</a>, Jung ChangThree women, all in the twentieth century, but detailing incredibly different experiences. The grandmother behaves like a dainty queen as a warlord’s concubine, the daughter does not stop toiling while pregnant, lest she be considered a burden to the ‘party’, and the granddaughter has to forgo her studies to serve the nation. It is a critical look at Mao’s China, and the impacts his dictates had on citizens, particularly women. It is a true story, but with far more unbelievable twists and turns than fiction.<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221110111148/636cd7a19c7e80680e092df1jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="640" height="976"><img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221110111148/636cd7a49c7e80680e092df2jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="640" height="1008"><a style="font-size: 15px; letter-spacing: 0.01em;" href="https://www.amazon.com/Poisonwood-Bible-Novel-Barbara-Kingsolver/dp/0060786507" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">The Poisonwood Bible</a>,Barbara KingsolverThe sheer canvas of this novel will take your breath away. It fiercely mocks every single thing that imperialism prides itself in. It is a love letter to the beautiful and prosperous land of Congo (then Zaire), and a satire on the white savior complex. It is basically a topsy-turvy account of a missionary family’s struggle in Congo, but is an analysis and commentary on so much more: racism, materialism, gender norms, religion, fanaticism, matrimony and relationships. It is, most bitingly, a revolt against white supremacy, and the exploitation of Africa by the West. The novel deserves to be read for an example of an impassioned, critical, and intelligent display of wisdom and justice.<a style="font-size: 15px; letter-spacing: 0.01em;" href="https://www.amazon.com/Song-Sun-God-Shankari-Chandran/dp/9558897280" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">Song of the Sun God</a>,Shankari ChandranThis underrated gem is an engrossing account of the devastating aftereffect of the civil war in Sri Lanka. In a searing tone that stays with you long after the novel is finished, Chandran traces the lives of three generations that are led astray by the struggle for power and identity. Her attempt is to recreate the war as a more objective, balanced, nuanced history, with careful observation of socio-cultural and state-inflicted inequalities that led to the eventual deadly eruption. It is a difficult work to read, and a tad dramatic, but an important and absorbing one. Another remarkable novel along the same theme is Madhuri Vijay’s ‘The Far Field.’<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221110111148/636cd7a79c7e80680e092df3jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="225" height="225"><img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221110111148/636cd7a89c7e80680e092df4jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="311" height="475"><a style="font-size: 15px; letter-spacing: 0.01em;" href="https://www.amazon.com/Wayward-Daughter-Kathmandu-Story/dp/9388326083" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">The Wayward Daughter</a>,Shradha GhaleThis is a coming-of-age novel of the quintessential middle-class Kathmandu girl. It is clever in its use of language, unerring in its imitation of the mundane nature of everyday life, and interesting in its fresh approach to a novel. Tangled with the girl’s lives are so many other tales: that of her migrating grandparents and hardworking parents. It exposes the insecurities and contradictions and duplicities within all of us, and brings us so much closer to the land. If you read only one book in this list, read this – because it is the present and future of Nepali women’s writing.

About women by women

<figure><img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221109101112/636b6fce9c7e80680e060043jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="2481" height="1656"/><figcaption>Amitabha Bagchi reeives the DSC prize 2019 from Pradeep Kumar Gyawali, Minister for Foreign Affairs, at Nepal Literature Festival in Pokhara in December 2019</figcaption></figure>There is not much to add about Amitabha Bagchi’s Half  The Night Is Gone that has not already been said. The winner of this year’s <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/2019-shortlist-announced-for-dsc-prize/">DSC Prize for South Asian Literature</a>, awarded at the <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/nepal-and-international-literature-festival/">Nepal Literature Festival in Pokhara</a> last month, the book has been readily deemed the ‘Great Indian Novel’ of our time.Bagchi sets most of his novel in Delhi, with parts in Agra and Banaras. Writing in pre-independence times, Dilli’s rich lore and the old ganga jamuni tehzeeb of North India is woven beautifully into the novel – with intercuts of a harder, less forgiving modern-day shown in letters between chapters.Bagchi carefully constructs his plot – a long winded ambitious tale that tells the story of two families and their men sprawling across generations. This story is told by the fictional, award-winning Hindi novelist, Vishwanath, who takes breaks to pen letters to his brother, his dead son’s girlfriend and his estranged wife.Goswami Tulsidas’s Ramcharitmanas (an Awadhi retelling of Ramayana) undercuts the novel being written within the novel, with additional Sanskrit sloka, Hindi-Urdu couplets, and Qur’anic hadith referenced throughout, each with an English translation. Bagchi’s greatest feat is the way the quoted verses always add to the narrative, never distracting or pulling a reader away. As <a href="https://www.thehindu.com/books/waiting-for-the-monkeys-return-review-of-amitabha-bagchis-half-the-night-is-gone-by-shreevatsa-nevatia/article24714584.ece">The Hindu</a> put it, this is not an ‘Indian novel in English’, it is an Indian novel.The men Vishwanath writes about are deeply flawed and violent – they beat, rape and abandon their wives (stylistically depicted as ‘claiming their conjugal rights’) and yet, somehow, they are always portrayed as layered and interesting individuals. The writing is confusing, it is unclear if the framing of women as always youthful, inherently lustful and scheming is meant to highlight the predicament of women in Indian society or if Vishwanath is just a bad writer.Whatever the motivation, it is the novel's glaring fault. It is difficult to read  Omvati (She manages to get a name – something not every female character in the novel is granted) who is molested by her father in law, and as she stabs and wounds him in a ‘… a coruscating sweep that left her quivering. She felt arousal’.Later in the novel, her husband reaches for her and Omvati throws up again and again. In response, her husband beats and bribes her and ‘takes to visiting prostitutes’. There is never an effort to depict her inner feelings and trauma – only his frustration.Bagchi is a gifted storyteller, creating varied and interesting relationships between his characters both within their families and across them. Diwanchand, the younger son of Lala Motichand, is so devoted to Tulsida Ramcharitmanas, he leaves his inheritance, wife and child to dedicate his life to the work.Makhan Lal, Lala Motichand’s illegitimate child, is a Marx-loving schoolteacher who resents his father. Vishwanath is devastated by his son’s death in a road accident, and only in his grief does he begin to try and repair his relationships. It is only the caricatures of women that leave an unfortunate stain on the novel, a book that otherwise speaks to nostalgia, of interfaith harmony and complex family dynamics.<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221109101116/636b6fd19c7e80680e060044jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="640" height="643">Half The Night Is GoneBy Amitabha BagchiJuggernaut, New Delhi, 2018320 pages    550 INRISBN:978-9386228703

A nostalgic Hindustani novel

<img width="1500" height="1000" src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221108151124/636a67019c7e80680e0599b6jpeg.jpg" alt=""/>Jamil Jan Kochai is the O Henry Prize-winning author of the novel <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Nights-Logar-Jamil-Jan-Kochai/dp/0525559191" target="_blank" rel="noopener">99 Nights in Logar</a>, which was <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/2019-shortlist-announced-for-dsc-prize/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">shortlisted for the DSC Prize for South Asian Literature</a>. Nepali Times sat down with him at the <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/nepal-and-international-literature-festival/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Nepal Literature Festival</a> in Pokhara on 15 December. Excerpts of interview:Nepali Times: An entire chapter in your English novel is in Pashto. What was your motivation?Jamil Jan Kochai: Initially, it started out as a craft issue more than anything else. I had been trying to write that chapter for a long time. The entire novel leads up to that story within the story, and it is a story that is actually based on real life events: this tragedy that occurred in my own family. It is a very sensitive, tender story and it haunted my whole childhood and my entire family. I knew it was going to be very difficult to write, but I did not anticipate that I would not be able to write it. I tried quite a few times and I would get a few sentences in, maybe a page in and it would just fall apart.Whenever I heard this story, it was always in bits and pieces and it was always in Pashto, because it was only meant for us and it was our story. That chapter ended up being directly from my father. He told the story as he remembered it. It is the story of the murder of his younger brother during the Soviet occupation of Afghanistan. I recorded him telling it. He was very picky about who could write the story down because he wanted it to be told in a very specific way and he wanted it written in a very specific way. We ended up finding someone who met his standards in his village in Logar.Initially there was some, not necessarily resistance, but certainly questions. My agent had questions about it, my editor had questions about it, other editors had questions about it, but when I discussed the intention of it and how I was having so much trouble telling that story, ultimately, my agent, my editor, my publisher – everyone was very supportive of it.It did take on its own sort of political ideological message. What happens to stories when they are translated? Who is the book meant for? For me, it is a story that is very precious to our family, told to me over and over again in Pashto. Finally I decided, ‘I am going to allow it to remain in this state instead of translating it and risk ruining it.’You also have all these non-English words in the novel. There is this sad thing where our entire second generation of immigrants in America that is coming up right now, we are losing touch with our language, but at the same time it still has a way of almost infecting our English and that is the way we talk. I always wanted to write in a voice that was true to the voice that belongs to my household. I think there are also certain words that are untranslatable.Could we talk a little bit about how you insert oral narratives and traditional stories in the novel?It became a central element of the novel, but just like the chapter in Pashto it initially had just been a craft issue. I had got to a point in the novel where, like 100 pages in, I had been writing a very traditional ‘boy’s adventure’ tale based on Huckleberry Finn and Rudyard Kipling’s Kim and all these novels I grew up reading. I did not know what the characters were going to do next.Up until then, I was watching the characters, seeing what choices they were going to make, seeing how they were interacting with each other, interacting with the land. Then the group split apart. Two of the characters were underneath a tree and they were stuck there and did not know how to leave because they did not know how to get back and they did not want to leave – I was like “What do I do here?”I ended up putting the novel away and going to my bookshelf and picking up a copy of The Arabian Nights, which I had purchased a long time ago, but it had been just sitting on my shelf for years and years. I opened up and I started reading it and I was just blown away by the beauty of these tales, the magic and also the radical form, almost experimental by today’s standards. I read the stories within the stories and I was looking at the way that the book was handling time and was able to play with tension and danger through the storytelling itself: it just felt so true to the way that we tell stories in our own house ... often lead into other stories, end halfway through, for whatever reason.So, I went back to that spot where I was stuck and instead of making the characters do something, I just let them tell stories and then the stories ended up leading to other events and other stories and it just completely changed the way I was writing the novel itself. Before, I was looking at action, choice, movement and event. Then I was searching out narratives – I was looking at who needs to tell the next story, who wanted to tell the next story.You have a lot of religious elements, almost underlying the novel – how intentional is it?I do not know how intentional it is. What I was trying to capture with the novel was how this boy from America in Afghanistan experienced the world. In a way, a central aspect of how he experienced the world was through Islam and specifically how it functioned in a small village in Logar province in Afghanistan, where you wake up to the sound of the adhan for prayer and then you work until the adhan for afternoon prayer and then you take a break. Time there is organised according to the Islamic prayers and then the narratives there circulate around the Quran, the hadith, and so in a way it felt very natural to the way I wanted to tell the story. It felt very natural to my own experience as a Muslim.I was conscious of the ways Islam was represented in America and how Muslims are represented in America. In particularly, this whole idea of the good Muslim versus the bad Muslim, which is a rhetoric I find really troubling where certain populations of Muslims become bomb-able and destroy-able because of how they are portrayed in the media. But then you have these good peaceful Muslims who need to be saved, need to be protected from their own people. I was very conscious of that, certainly. You even put one, or a mixture, of stories from the Quran. Was that deliberate?That took a lot of deliberation because I was actually worried about like, if my imam read that book and read that section, what he would think about it. Or if my father – he has not read the book, I have explained the book to him – but if he somehow heard that, “Oh, your son went and retold a story from the Quran.” I was a little nervous about it.Your book is semi-autobiographical – how real is the story?I would say a lot of elements are heavily autobiographical. When I was 12 years old, I went back to my parents’ home village in Logar and I had adventures with my cousins and so, certainly, it begins with my memories. People that I knew, people that I loved. What I ended up doing with the novel was that I allowed these memories to go off in their own directions and become what they wanted to become within the narrative.Budabash is a real dog. He was our guard dog in our compound in Afghanistan. He absolutely hated me, that was true, but he never did bite off the tip of my finger. He did get loose out onto the village and we had to go after him, but I did not actually take part in the chase. My cousins did and it was something I would often think about. So the first time it really started with this idea, “What if I hadn’t been afraid of going on this chase with my cousins, what would have happened?”Are there any Afghan Americans you are excited about?Aria Aber. Her poetry collection came out recently and she had a poem published in The New Yorker as well. Very talented, I want to give her a shout out.<a href="https://aaawa.net/aaawa-launches-fragmented-futures-afghanistan-100-years-later-in-glendale-ca/" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://aaawa.net/aaawa-launches-fragmented-futures-afghanistan-100-years-later-in-glendale-ca/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1576928521873000&amp;usg=AFQjCNHrb58czF9kkW_UwDKZuWo3834Usw">Fragmented Futures.</a> It was set up by an Afghan American art organisation in California and they put together this incredible magazine of just Afghan artists and it was photography, paintings, poetry and fiction as well. Incredible work. I was overwhelmed by how talented they were -- it got me very emotional. I’m very excited about this next generation of writers who are coming out of these communities in the States.

Debut novelist lets Afghans speak for themselves

<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221108151124/636a66d89c7e80680e0599a9jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="1750" height="1164"/>Ram Sharan Mahat, <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/nation/ram-sharan-mahat-fund-raising-conference,2299" target="_blank" rel="noopener">former foreign and finance minister</a> of the Nepali Congress, has published an important book that serves as an explainer and update on Nepal’s political transition and state restructuring exercise. It is an encyclopaedic dive into the political economy of present-day Nepal, useful not only for non-Nepali readers, but also Nepali students seeking to understand history, trends and context.A senior member of the Nepali Congress party, Mahat lost his seat in Parliament in 2018, after having consecutively won four parliamentary elections from Nuwakot since 1994. This forced respite actually allowed the economist-politician the time required to pen his thoughts on critical national events of the past two decades, committed as he is to the middle way that shuns populism and profligate governance.This work, together with <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/featured-videos/kul-chandra-gautams-long-journey-home/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Kul Chandra Gautam</a>’s <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/nation/Lost-in-transition-kul-chandra-gautam-review,2734" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Lost in Transition</a> (2014), provides antidote to the English language narrative of the conflict and post-conflict transitional era, which has been presented mainly by writers bowled over by radical leftism. Trials, Tremors and Hope also complements Mahat’s earlier work, <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/news.php?id=739#.Xfs9dZMzaUk" target="_blank" rel="noopener">In Defence of Democracy</a> (2005), published even as King Gyanendra sought to convert Nepal into a royal autocracy.Mahat is the person who guided Nepal into the era of liberal economics, and rather than be coy he spends considerable space here defending his plans and policies as a six-time finance minister. He introduces us to BP Koirala’s evolving thinking on economic governance, and reminds the readers of once-important entities such as the Socialist International, and the Club of Rome and its ‘Limits to Growth’.Mahat was sceptical of not a few elements that went into the new Constitution, fought a rearguard action on the establishment of provinces, and advocated local government energy channelled via the 75 districts. And yet, unlike many Constituent Assembly members who became lukewarm towards the document they promulgated, the author seeks ways to implement the Constitution as the only way forward.He writes: “Managing the new federal structure is an un-tested and daunting challenge. The multiple levels of governance in a relatively small country with a history of centralised administration creates problems of overlap, ambiguity and conflict of authority… The main task at present is to building of institutional capacity at the sub-national and local levels … (with) supporting legislation, regulations and necessary manpower they are lacking at present.”With the Constitution declaring Nepal a ‘socialism-oriented’ (‘samajbad unmukh’) economy, it has been imperative to have authoritative interpretations of the phrase to avoid confusion, and to save the society from the radical trap. The economist and administrator in Mahat does not fail in providing his elucidation. Noting that “there has been no major change in the fundamental orientation of the country” despite the regime change, he writes: “ The socialist objectives are to be met through democratic norms and values including competitive plural politics, as well as an elaborate list of fundamental rights, including those related to social protection, the security of property rights, among others.”Elsewhere, to drive home the point, Mahat writes that the goal of socialism is guaranteed to be based on “competitive multiparty politics – including periodic elections, adult franchise, press freedom, civil liberty and an independent and impartial judiciary.”Decrying the “unproductive recurrent spending which is rising as a result of competitive populism”, the author suggests capitalising on the comparative advantage possessed by the country in “clean energy, biodiversity, eco-tourism, together with cultural heritage, strategic <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/political-geography-of-india-nepal-china-ties/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">geo-political location between China and India</a>, and the goodwill accorded to Nepal by the international community.”At a time when many intellectuals prefer to handle the Maoists with kids gloves, especially now that they are tied umbilically to the erstwhile UML, Mahat is clear on what the <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/nation/wartime-rape-victims-of-Kanchanpur-speak-out-wait-for-justice,4222" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Maoist conflict</a> “inflicted on the nation” – besides the deaths and maimings, “disruption of social and economic lives, destruction of physical assets and infrastructure, leading to derailment of development and slowing down of economic growth”.For a work with such a sweep, over 12 chapters and 242 pages, there are some aspects that Mahat has preferred to side-step partly that maybe because he is top leader of the Nepali Congress, which itself is hardly playing the role of a responsible and critical opposition to the present very-powerful CPN government. One would have wanted Mahat to be less descriptive and non-opinionated, and not be too careful about who’s toes he would be stepping on.While the author does refer to <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/editorial/autopsy-of-a-blockade%20,2863" target="_blank" rel="noopener">the Indian blockade of 2015</a>, he does not dwell much on how those five months became an economic and geopolitical watershed for modern Nepal. He is ideally placed to discuss the potential debt trap of being over-beholden to Chinese debt largesse, but there is not enough discussion of that here. As Nepal rushes <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/in-conservation-nepal-is-not-out-of-the-woods-yet/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">headlong into infrastructural development</a>, Mahat should have made his position clear on what is propped up as the ‘development vs. environment’ debate, but he takes a pass.How is Nepal to emerge from the <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/editorial/reducing-labour-pain/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">remittance economy</a>? Mahat does warn that the reliance on remittance “has reduced pressure to generate more productive employment leading to loss of the country’s competitiveness”, but the author was well placed to provide a guide to generating in-country employment. Similarly, a wide-ranging work such as this required rumination on the <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/nepal-must-prepare-for-climate-migration/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">climate crisis</a>, which is set to hit Nepal’s population and economy, and Southasia as a whole.Trials, Tremors and Hopeby Ram Sharan MahatAdroit Publishers, New Delhi (2019)IRS795       242 pages<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221108151124/636a66db9c7e80680e0599aajpeg.jpg" alt="" width="1079" height="1632">

History and context from Mahat

<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221108151120/636a65b89c7e80680e059942jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="3762" height="2700"/>The 9th<a href="http://dscprize.com/">DSC Prize for South Asian Literature</a> will be holding its award ceremony this year during the IME Nepal Literature Festival closing ceremony on 16 December.This year’s <a href="http://dscprize.com/2019/11/06/shortlist-announced-for-the-dsc-prize-for-south-asian-literature-2019/">shortlist of six books</a> are: Half the Night is Gone by Amitabh Bagchi, 99 Nights in Logar by Jamil Jan Kochai, The Far Field by Madhuri Vijay, There’s Gunpowder in the Air by Manoranjan Byapari, The City and the Sea by Raj Kamal Jha, and The Empty Room by Sadia Abbas.DSC Prize is now in its ninth year, and is one of the most prestigious international literary awards specifically focused on South Asian fiction writing. Among the six shortlisted, four are authors of Indian origin and one writer each is originally from Pakistan and Afghan. It includes three debut novelists including two women writers, as well as a work of translation of a novel originally written in Bengali.The Prize was founded by Surina Narula and Manhad Narula in 2010, and is administered by the South Asian Literature Prize &amp; Events Trust. It received 90 eligible entries this year. This year’s international jury panel includes Harish Trivedi (Jury Chair) former Professor of English, Jeremy Tambling, former Professor of Literature, Kunda Dixit, Editor of the Nepali Times newspaper, Carmen Wickramagamage, Professor of English, and Rifat Munim, literary editor of the Dhaka Tribune.Said jury chair Harish Trivedi: “Three of the shortlisted writers live in South Asia and three live abroad — which may not come as a complete surprise. There is now a South Asia beyond South Asia.”Last year’s winner was <a href="https://harpercollins.co.in/book/no-presents-please/">No Presents Please: Mumbai Stories</a> written in Kannada by Jayant Kaikini and translated into English by Tejaswini Niranjana. Earlier winners of the DSC Prize include: Past winners of the DSC South Asian include: H M Naqvi from Pakistan, Shehan Karunatilaka from Sri Lanka, Jeet Thayil and Cyrus Mistry from India, American Jhumpa Lahiri, Anuradha Roy from India and Sri Lankan author Anuk Arudpragasam.Previous award ceremonies have rotated between the Galle Literary Festival in Sri Lanka in 2016, the Dhaka Lit Fest in Bangladesh in 2017, and the Tata Steel Kolkata Literary meet last year India. Administered by the South Asian Literature Prize and Events Trust, this award’s mission is focused on raising the profile of writing around the world by rewarding authors who write about the South Asian region with a purse of $25,000 and is available to writers of any ethnicity or nationality as long as the work pertains to the region in content and theme.“The prize and the Nepal Literature Festival share a common vision to promote and highlight South Asian literature, and there’s a rich literary landscape in Nepal which I hope will benefit from this partnership,” said Sunita Narula. “There’s a significant amount of writing emanating from and about the South Asian region that needs to be showcased and presented to a larger global readership.”Half the Night is Gone by Amitabha Bagchi delves into modern society as it grapples with religion and art. 99 Nights in Logar by Jamil Jan Kochai is a coming-of-age story about a boy’s journey across Afghanistan in search of his family dog. The Far Field by Madhuri Vijay looks are prejudice in India with special focus on Kashmir. It has already won the <a href="https://scribbes.com/books/the-far-field-madhuri-vijay-jcb-prize-for-literature-2019-winner/">JCB Prize for Literature</a>. There’s Gunpowder in the Air by Manoranjan Byapari is translated from the Bengali original by Arunava Sinha and looks at the Naxalite movement of the 1960s. The City and the Sea by Raj Kamal Jha uses the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2012_Delhi_gang_rape">2012 rape tragedy</a> in New Delhi for a transcontinental journey to look at how people do unimaginable things. The Empty Room by Sadia Abbas portrays the struggle of a Karachi woman for creative expression.The Nepal Literature Festival was started 9 years ago and has hosted noted Nepali and South Asian writers. Said festival director Ajit Baral: “The DSC Award fits in well with our goal of turning the Nepal Literature Festival into a neutral South Asian forum for writers, artists, public intellectuals and politicians of the region to come together and discuss issues, some of which may be off-limits in other parts of the region.”

DSC Prize in Pokhara on 16 December

<figure><img width="1968" height="1312" src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221108181144/636a95809c7e80680e05dc10jpeg.jpg" alt=""/><figcaption>Harish Trivedi, Jury Chair of the DSC Prize 2019, at the Shortlist Announcement event in London</figcaption></figure>The 2019 shortlist of books for the annual DSC prize for South Asian Literature has been announced. Half the Night is Gone by Amitabh Bagchi, 99 Nights in Logar by Jamil Jan Kochai, The Far Field by Madhuri Vijay, There’s Gunpowder in the Air by Manoranjan Byapari, The City and the Sea by Raj Kamal Jha, and The Empty Room by Sadia Abbas have made it to the shortlist, from 15 books long listed.  <img width="3762" height="2700" src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221108181144/636a95849c7e80680e05dc11jpeg.jpg" alt="">The DSC Prize is now in its ninth year, and is one of the most prestigious international literary awards specifically focused on South Asian fiction writing. Among the six four are authors of Indian origin and one author each of Pakistani and Afghan origin. It includes 3 debut novelists including 2 women writers, as well as a work of translation of a novel originally written in Bengali.Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/review/written-locally-read-globally/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Written locally, read globally</a>, Sewa Bhattarai The chair of the jury panel Harish Trivedi announced the shortlist at for the prize of US $25,000 at London School of Economics &amp; Political Science. “The shortlist that we have arrived at comprises six novels – for the good reason that the five jurors, located in five different countries, could not agree on just five novels. Two of the six novels are set partly in New Delhi, and partly in the surrounding countryside in one case, and in the other case partly on the Baltic coast. One of the novels is set in Pakistan of the 1970s, one in Kashmir, and one in Afghanistan. The sixth is set in a prison,” said Trivedi.The Prize was founded by Surina Narula and Manhad Narula in 2010, and is administered by the South Asian Literature Prize &amp; Events Trust. It received 90 eligible entries this year. This year’s international jury panel includes Harish Trivedi (Jury Chair) former Professor of English, Jeremy Tambling, former Professor of Literature, Kunda Dixit, Editor of the Nepali Times newspaper, Carmen Wickramagamage, Professor of English, and Rifat Munim, literary editor of Dhaka Tribune. This year the winner of the DSC Prize 2019 will be announced at the <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/business/nepal-lit-festival/">IME Nepal Literature Festival in Pokhara</a> in Nepal on 13-16 December.Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/business/nepal-lit-festival/">Nepal Lit Festival</a>

2019 shortlist announced for DSC Prize

<figure><img width="640" height="435" src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221108141156/636a60429c7e80680e056e6ejpeg.jpg" alt=""/><figcaption>Gurkha soldiers in the battle of Gallipoli. they were the first to arrive and the last to leave, and suffered at least 1,000 dead and 4,000 wounded. A part of the battlefield in Turkey is still called Gurkha Bluff. PHOTO: IMPERIAL WAR MUSEUM</figcaption></figure>There have been many <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/review/The-Khukri-Braves-review,2945" target="_blank" rel="noopener">books written about the Gurkhas</a>, their first recruitment during the Anglo-Nepal Wars in 1815, their history in defence of the British Empire, about the Afghan campaign, on Flanders Field and <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/nation/gurkhas-at-Gallipoli-part-three,2330" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Gallipoli in World War I</a>, and Malaysia, the Burma front and in Monte Cassino in World War II. More than 50,000 Nepali soldiers were killed in the two world wars defending the British Empire.There is a new account of the Nepali soldiers in the British Army, and this is an inside story by one the seniormost and most experienced officers. <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Gurkha-Odyssey-Campaigning-Peter-Duffell/dp/152673057X" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Gurkha Odyssey: Campaigning for the Crown</a> by General Sir Peter Duffell is a tribute to the <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/nation/Gurkhas-dying-for-others,2938" target="_blank" rel="noopener">200 years of brave and loyal service to the Crown</a> – the British crown, not the Nepali one. Well, Nepal is not a monarchy anymore, and because after 1816 Nepali soldiers did not really have to spill their blood to defend their homeland till the Maoist conflict in 1996-2006.Duffell (pictured right) combines the broader <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/editorial/Nepalis-waited-200-years-for-country-to-be-proud-of,2939" target="_blank" rel="noopener">history of Gurkhas</a> in the British Army with his own personal experience commanding the Nepalis in the ranks. We know the history well, the expansionist Gurkha empire was on a collision course with the Honourable East India Company and full scale war broke out in 1814. (Just how ‘honourable’ The Company was we can find out in William Dalrymple’s latest book The Anarchy:  The Relentless Rise of the East India Company. But that is another review.)<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221108141156/636a60449c7e80680e056e6fjpeg.jpg" alt="" width="530" height="428">British officers and their Indian sepoys encounter Nepal’s first line of defence: the <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/here-now/the-mosquito-that-changed-nepals-history/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">malaria mosquito</a> and then have to contend with the ‘martial spirit of an indomitable foe’. Impressed by their courage and discipline, the British start recruiting the soldiers they were fighting even before the end of the war: forcing Nepalis to fight Nepalis defending their forts in Garhwal and Kumaon.The book that is being released this month is compellingly written with illustration by Ken Howard, and follows ‘the light-hearted and gallant soldiers’ in battles of Empire: from the North-West Frontier through two World Wars to the Falklands. Ironically, after fighting alongside the British in Helmand Province in 1847, the Nepalis are back in Helmand as part of NATO forces where they have won more than 100 medals for gallantry but at the cost of many lives.General Duffell has seen the <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/lest-we-forget/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Gurkhas in action</a> up close and personal, and vividly recounts some of his own experiences with the soldiers from Nepal – having commanded them at every level from Subaltern to General in the battlefield and in peacetime since 1960. Peter Duffell was awarded the Military Cross after leading the Gurkhas under his command in jungle guerrilla warfare in Borneo in 1960. He served as General Commanding British Forces in Hong Kong between 1989 and 1992, in charge of the Gurkha brigade there just before the handover.Fluent in Nepali, he has got to understand the soldiers under his command well, which gives the book added authenticity.Gurkha Odyssey: Campaigning for the CrownPen &amp; Sword Books Ltd, 2019304 pages      £25 hardbackISBN: 9781526730572www.pen-and-sword.co.uk<a href="https://www.amazon.com/Gurkha-Odyssey-Campaigning-Peter-Duffell/dp/152673057X"><img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221108141156/636a60469c7e80680e056e70jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="1716" height="2560"></a>

New Gurkha book

<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221108141124/636a58cf9c7e80680e05485bjpeg.jpg" alt="" width="1400" height="1400"/> T his time of year <a href="https://nepalitimes.atavist.com/high-and-dry-upper-mustang" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Mustang</a> is a profusion of colour: lapis lazuli sky with dazzling clouds, purple fields of buckwheat, ripening golden barley terraces, Dhakmar’s towering red cliffs, yellow rocks, salmon sunsets.So why would <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/nepali-times-buzz/profile-of-kevin-bubriski-photographer,1954" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Kevin Bubriski</a> and Sienna Craig publish a photo book called <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Mustang-Black-White-Sienna-Craig/dp/9937623871" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Mustang in Black and White</a>?As Tibetologist Charles Ramble explains in the preface, ‘Mustang: Black and White, But Never Gray’, the Kingdom of Lo was historically perceived as a ‘dark’ corner. Even early Bon Tibetans found the place forbidding and inhabited by demons.But Ramble gives <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/blogs/kundadixit/2012/09/07/monsoon-in-the-rainshadow/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Mustang</a>’s ‘darkness’ a positive attribute. ‘Sometimes, darkness is the best place in which to see the cosmos in its full radiance,’ he writes. Anyone who has gazed up at the Milky Way from the starlit landscape around the ancient monastery at Lo Gekar will know what he is talking about.Mustang is technically in Nepal, but is part of the trans-Himalayan plateau, situated on what used to be the shores of the Tethys Sea. Exposed boulders high on cliff faces were once strewn on the banks of the prehistoric Kali Gandaki, which cut through the mountains as they rose, lifting fossilised ammonites that once crawled the ocean floor.Bubriski writes that Mustang’s colours have always fascinated him, adding: ‘My choice to represent Mustang in black and white was motivated by the dramatic power of how the bright sunlight and deep shadows transform the physical earthen forms and shapes of chörten, gompa, mountains, ladders and doorways into visually powerful and compelling compositions.’<a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/news.php?id=1153" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Bubriski first came to Nepal</a> in 1975, spending two years in Humla as a <a href="https://nepalitimes.atavist.com/untitled-project-rmc8q" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Peace Corps</a> volunteer. Most of his photographic life has been in darkrooms working with black and white prints, eschewing the digital camera. Finally giving in, he now uses a smartphone app for square black and white images with artificially frayed edges.Artists have been <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/review/mustang-on-canvas/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">inspired by Mustang to use various medium</a> to capture its richness. Robert Powell took to water colour to depict Mustang in his book <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Earth-Door-Sky-Paintings-Mustang/dp/0906026539" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Earth Door Sky Door: Paintings of Mustang</a>. Bubriski explains his choice of black and white photography: ‘As the reality of the colour world was distilled by my eye… I found the visual transformation and abstraction intriguing with what it added, yet also with what it took away.’<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221108141124/636a58d29c7e80680e05485cjpeg.jpg" alt="" width="700" height="700">Sienna Craig is an anthropologist who first travelled to Mustang in 1993, and has kept coming back for research. In stark, poetic prose in chapters that take us town-by-town up the trail, she describes how the place is changing with outmigration, the arrival of the road and mobile connectivity.Even the <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/living-below-nepals-melting-mountains/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">climate breakdown</a> is forcing villages to relocate and swollen glacial lakes' bursts regularly bringing down destructive torrents of grey mud paste and boulders.  There are now <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/mixed-blessings-in-mustang/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">vast apple plantations</a> where it was once too cold for orchards.Change is a constant in Mustang today. The trails at Tsarang have hoof marks next to tractor tyre tracks. Mule trains are being replaced by Boleros, young men in Adidas caps and Nike sneakers loiter by sidewalk shrines, waiting for travel documents that will take them to Korea or Iraq. With no men to work the fields, diesel threshers do the harvesting. The sound of <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/k-pop-in-k-town/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">K-pop</a> wafts with the wind in the poplars in Choser.Yet even with change, the ruins of ancient forts blend back into the cliffs they were built on. Eroded by the wind, it is hard to tell what is monastery and what is mountain — they are embedded in each other.‘Has the wind carved this landscape to resemble the ruins of ancient buildings? Or are these manmade remnants of an ancient civilisation?’ asks Craig. Maybe both, as abandoned homes dissolve back into the landscape. In exquisite monochrome and lyrical text, Bubriski and Craig have captured Mustang in a photo frame of time ‘neither past nor future, just present’. Change has come to Mustang, but Mustang will keep its mystery and darkness.<figure><img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221108141124/636a58d59c7e80680e05485djpeg.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="276"><figcaption> </figcaption></figure><figure><img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221108141124/636a58d69c7e80680e05485ejpeg.jpg" alt="" width="300" height="276"><figcaption> </figcaption></figure>Charles Ramble has himself co-authored a new book (also published by Vajra) on the abandoned settlement of Chuksang, where once stood a 17th-century nunnery. <a href="https://www.amazon.com/Blessing-Land-Architecture-History-Buddhist/dp/9937928826" target="_blank" rel="noopener">A Blessing for the Land</a> traces the history of the head lama of Künzang Chöling, who dedicated his monastery to the land, choosing the slope on the other side of the Kali Gandaki known as ‘Convent Ridge’. Although on the academic side, the book is part-archaeology, part-architecture, part-anthropology, but mostly it is deep history.Ramble and other authors work with archaeologist Nyima Drandul from Mustang, who is a descendant of the Künzang Chöling nobility. A Blessing for the Land and Mustang in Black and White are both available in Kathmandu book stores, and are fascinating journeys in time and space. Both books force us to rethink Nepal’s diverse cultural history, and to ponder how much more of our past we do not yet know as we plunge into an uncharted future.

Kunda Dixit

Mustang in shadows and light

One smoggy winter morning in February 2019, Ekta regretted coming to her sculpture class. It was the first day of her period, and the 19-year-old wished she was home, curled up in bed with a hot water bag to soothe her cramps.
Her class was at Kalapremi Ceramic Studio, a dark room on the ground floor of a house in Maharajganj, and Ekta’s teacher was the artist Gopal Das Shrestha ‘Kalapremi’, a noted sculptor.
Two other students were already there, using all their muscle strength to knead the sculpting clay. Ekta, now 24, recalls how Kalapremi asked her if she was feeling all right. She avoided him, as she did not want everyone to know she was menstruating.
Kalapremi repeatedly asked Ekta what was wrong. She finally muttered that she was having her period, after which he grabbed her hand and led her to a partitioned corner of the studio and sat her on a chair. Before she could stop him, he slid his hand under her dress, and started massaging her abdomen.
“I was horrified,” Ekta recalls. “I told him to stop, but he didn’t listen, asking me not to be shy, saying he knew how to relieve my pain. He stopped only after I protested furiously.”&nbsp;
The art tutor then said, “You’re like my daughter. I’m doing it out of love to make you feel better, but you’re so stubborn.”&nbsp;
“Instead of saying sorry he acted like I was the one having crazy thoughts,” remembers Ekta, adding that from April 2016 to August 2020 beginning the time she was 16, the artist sexually abused and harassed her on several occasions. &nbsp;
Now, Ekta and the artist’s other former students are finally sharing their experiences and some are pressing legal charges against him, hoping that others do not have to endure what they did.&nbsp;
Award-winning artist and teacher Gopal Das Shrestha ‘Kalapremi’ (the name means ‘Art Lover’) is known for his ceramic art, sculpture, and contemporary pottery. He was <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/review/the-house-of-kalapremi">profiled in Nepali Times after a collaborative exhibition</a>, ‘Where the Wild Things Are’ at the Siddhartha Art Gallery three years ago.&nbsp;
His pieces, titled Gaalis, featured sculpted female figures with the heads of dogs, sheep, and donkeys (pictured) to depict derogatory terms for women. Some critics said the collection was a satire on feminists.
Kalapremi started his artistic and teaching career in 1983 and over the years taught at Bhanubhakta School, Kathmandu University School of Arts, Lalitkala Campus and at his private Kalapremi Ceramic Studio. He has also lectured at Jeonju University in South Korea and recently at Tabor Academy in the United States.
Seven of Kalapremi’s former students were interviewed for this story. Five female students said he touched them inappropriately in his studio or at Kathmandu University. Two male students said they witnessed him abuse and harass the women. In all cases, the students struggled to recognise the abuse when it occurred, and the lack of reporting systems left them to cope on their own for years.&nbsp;
Earlier this year, students shared a social media post hinting at Kalapremi’s history of abusive behaviour following which more students of the artist reached out sharing similar experiences. Some students spoke of abuse that happened as long as 20 years ago.
Kalapremi, 60, has denied the allegations. He told Nepali Times: “Some years ago, there was a movement encouraging people to hug and kiss. I used to do it purely out of friendship and love. But after seeing posts on social media last year calling out my behaviour, I realised my actions may have hurt some people. I understand now that I should have been more mindful.”
He added: “I am also an auxiliary health worker, so I know the exact points to massage to relieve menstrual pain. It’s not just menstruation, I take anyone who is ill to the hospital.”
Sexual abuse is much more rampant than reported given how difficult it is to prove it in court. The law defines sexual abuse as occuring when someone touches another’s private parts, coerces them into touching theirs, uses vulgar language, shows degrading images, or behaves indecently towards them without consent.&nbsp;
Ekta and her fellow students are consulting lawyer Suneeta Regmi Pokhrel, who says they know that even if the court decides in their favour, it is difficult to survive after speaking up, and influential men defend themselves saying they are being framed.&nbsp;
“They are in a lot of pain and weep when recalling how he abused them,” Regmi Pokhrel told us. “They are angry and have filed a case against him, but they are also terrified. They know he is a powerful man and they have seen how our society treats women who speak up against abusers. Unless people speak up, perpetrators will be emboldened.”
Art and academia in Nepal simply reflect the power imbalances in society where people with intersecting identities experience worse forms of abuse. Theatre actors Raj Kumar Pudasaini, Rajan Khatiwada, and Sunil Pokhrel were called out during the #MeToo movement in the Nepali theatre scene in 2019. Even after the allegations Pokhrel went on to receive national awards, while others continued to work without repercussions.
“If you speak up against abusers, you gradually get sidelined from projects,” explained a theatre artist who wished anonymity fearing professional setbacks. “The theatre scene in Nepal is quite small, you just have to make peace with the perpetrators and work with them if you want to sustain yourself.”&nbsp;
In academia there is a history of faculty members sexually harassing students and getting away with it. After Tribhuvan University (TU) lecturer Krishna Bhattachan was accused of harassing women students, the university said it would follow Nepal’s sexual harassment law and set up a reporting mechanism. But nothing happened to the professor, who had already retired. Instead, he counter-accused the students of 'attacking the indigenous people’s movement with baseless allegations' as <a href="https://kathmandupost.com/letters/2019/01/29/bhattachan-responds">he told the Kathmandu Post in 2019</a>. He continues to be featured as a prominent speaker including at TU.
Other faculty members previously accused of sexual harassment include Jagadish Murti Koirala from TU, Bishnu Prasad Acharya from Ratna Rajya Campus, and Bodha Raj Tripathee from Lalitpur Madhyamik Vidhyalaya. A woman staff member from TU also filed a sexual abuse complaint against Dambar Chemjong from TU.
Prominent figures like <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/the-rise-and-fall-of-nims-purja">mountaineer Nims Purja</a> have been <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/31/sports/mountaineering-sexual-harassment-abuse-nims-purja.html">accused of sexual assault</a>, and cricketer Sandeep Lamichhane, actor <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/celebrity-rape-case-spotlights-nepal-laws">Paul Shah</a>, and former speaker of Parliament <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/mahara-arrested">Krishna Bahadur Mahara</a> have been accused of rape, but society-at-large has let off the alleged perpetrators amdist a larger debate about justice for survivors and punishment of perpetrators.&nbsp;
‘Gaushala-26’ is the court name given to the 18-year-old who accused Sandeep Lamichhane, former captain of Nepal’s national cricket team and skipper of Biratnagar Kings in the <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/here-comes-the-nepal-premier-league">ongoing Nepal Premier League</a>, of rape. She left the country citing society questioning her character affecting her mental health while Lamichhane got an outpouring of support. In May, the Patan High Court overturned a prior verdict that found Lamichhane guilty of rape and had sentenced him to eight years in prison. During the 23-month legal battle to pursue justice, Gaushala-26 faced threats of gang rape and acid attacks.&nbsp;
Exhausted by the struggle, Gaushala-26 sought to “move to a new world” where she could live free without hiding her identity.
Actress Samragyee Rajya Laxmi Shah in an Instagram video now deleted detailed the harassment she faced from a filmmaker during a movie shoot. She did not name any name but veteran actor Bhuwan KC filed a defamation case against Rana, but the court ruled that the charge lacked sufficient evidence.&nbsp;
Former Kathmandu mayor <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/theytoo">Keshav Sthapit also mocked the #MeToo movement</a>, calling accusations against him by journalists Rashmila Prajapati and Ujjwala Maharjan “a rape of men’s rights”.
Serial Abuse
Back at the Kalapremi Ceramics studio, another former student, 24-year-old Rajiv, says he felt the need to speak out after seeing his female classmates being abused.&nbsp;
“He frequently kissed them on their cheeks,” he told Nepali Times. “Whenever they walked into the studio he flailed his arms like a child asking for a hug. They awkwardly hugged him from the side, but he pulled them closer, held their chin, and kissed their cheeks.”&nbsp;
Rajiv says he also saw Kalapremi pull the women’s bra straps, touch their breasts, and slap their buttocks. The young students would freeze, not knowing how to react, and if they protested, he would say it was “normal in art”. Rajiv, 19 at the time like his classmates, remembers thinking perhaps the well-respected artist was right after all.
Another student, Luna, who took lessons at Kalapremi’s studio from 2020 to 2022 did try to confront the tutor after he made an obscene proposal to her. She recalls: “One day when the other students had left the studio and it was just the two of us, he told me that God had given him special artistic talent and he could transfer those powers to me. But to do that both of us will have to be naked, inside a dark room, and have sex.”
Luna, who was 18 then, was livid and told him she did not want any of his powers, but she says he laughed at her as if he was joking. She did not tell her family about the incident because she thought no one would believe her.&nbsp;
“They were all in awe of this famous artist and felt I should be grateful that to be learning sculpting from him,” she says. “I was scared to be alone with him in case he talked about sex again. My coping mechanism was to be rude so he wouldn’t try to come close to me.”
Seeing how some classmates were standing up to Kalapremi, Ekta too tried to push back against his advances, but she said he found ways to coerce her. Since Ekta, Rajiv, and Luna could not afford Kalapremi’s Rs30,000 monthly fee for lessons, he had offered them all a stipend to assist him in the studio.
“He had spondylosis and took me to his therapy sessions to learn massage techniques, then he often made me and other students massage him,” says Ekta. Whenever she refused, he would feign pain to make her feel sorry for him. “He would insist that I put my hands under his shirt so that I could massage him better,” she adds.
The art tutor often tried to “seduce sympathy” from Ekta by sharing how he had never been loved as a child and was “sexually frustrated” as an adult.&nbsp;
“At 7PM, he would pour himself Signature whiskey and immediately go off again about how he was sex-starved. I didn’t know how to respond. It took me time to realise alcohol was just an excuse to talk about sex,” Ekta says.
If convicted, Kalapremi could face financial penalty and/or a prison sentence of up to three years according to Section 224 of National Penal (Code) Act 2017.&nbsp;
Data suggests that victims of child sexual abuse on average take nearly 24 years to tell someone about their trauma, and some may never disclose it at all.&nbsp;
“In our culture, children are rarely taught about boundaries. They often react, show anger when adults pinch their cheeks. But adults insist they did it out of love, and force the children to accept it,” says Sita Lama, a psychotherapist at Manka Kura. “And even when someone touches them inappropriately they struggle to identify and verbalise it.”
When perpetrators claim to be “acting out of love”, Lama says survivors are likely to perceive it as something safe, rather than recognising it as abuse.&nbsp;
“It may take years for them to realise they were abused,” she explains. "And even when they become aware, the power imbalance with the abuser and the associated shame often prevents survivors from speaking up."
Other former students from the School of Art at Kathmandu University have also come forward years later, saying Kalapremi sexually abused them. As young adults, they felt his behaviour was off but were uncertain if it was inappropriate, illegal, or they did not know how to respond. After having understood that it was indeed abuse, they say they are speaking out now to protect others.&nbsp;
Amina Singh, a visiting faculty member at Kathmandu University, says there is no clause against sexual abuse in contracts of teachers, and there is no formal grievance handling mechanism for the students.&nbsp;
“So the only way students can to deal with sexual abuse is approach someone they trust,” she says.
Eight other former art students of Lalit Kala Campus and Srijana College of Fine Arts of Tribhuvan University and other private art studios in Kathmandu say they were also sexually abused by their art teachers. Three faculty members interviewed from these institutions said they saw the abuse, but felt it was futile to report it given how powerful the teachers were.
In the absence of a formal system, some longtime women artists warned each other about “problematic” artists. They shared &nbsp;a “heads-up” to be more cautious when collaborating with them, and avoided responding to their calls and texts after work hours.
To ensure art institutions are safe for all, galleries, museums, artist studios, and smaller art spaces need to develop policies on sexual harassment. This would include a code of conduct or studio policies that hold the leadership accountable and outline the principles of professional ethics.&nbsp;
Students and employees should inquire about accountability mechanisms for raising concerns, both formally and informally, advocates say.
Three years after Ekta left the ceramics studio, she learnt that Kalapremi had harassed many other women. Still trying to get a footing in the art industry, she attended a workshop in Kathmandu where women artists discussed ways to stay safe in the art sector.&nbsp;
Since it was a close-knit group Ekta opened up about how she felt violated and realised she was not alone, he had been abusing underprivileged students for years, and this was common knowledge among artists in Nepal.
Ekta says that even after she quit, Kalapremi continued sending her text messages like ‘I am thinking of you’, ‘Why have you stopped speaking with me’, or ‘I am waiting for your call’.&nbsp;
But what really forced her to act was when Ekta found out that he was sending similar texts to her younger sister.&nbsp;
“I’ve had enough,” she told us. “He abused me all these years but I won’t let him abuse my sister.” &nbsp;
Ekta, Rajiv and Luna are not the real names of the students.&nbsp;

‘Art Lover’ accused of sexual abuse

It was 8:15 in the evening of 25 March 1968 when everyone in the village of Batulechaur near Pokhara heard a deafening sound like thunder as a bright flashing object hurtled down to land in a field.&nbsp; That field belonged to Kul Timilsina, and the next morning he retrieved a sheet of metal about 2m by 1m and carried it home with the help of a few others, thinking it would be useful for his buffalo shed.&nbsp; Before he died at age 83 three years ago, Timilsina had told photo archivist Sunil Ulak that the black metal sheet was not rectangular and had rounded corners. There are a few witnesses still alive who have a clear recollection of the object that fell from the sky that night.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2024120707128_75cc85aac56b9cc4a77366471f058d7b3eb6868776811b0923845c2d0a61f014.jpg" data-media-id="editor_0" data-image-id="2024120707128_75cc85aac56b9cc4a77366471f058d7b3eb6868776811b0923845c2d0a61f014" data-rendition-name="original" width="1170" height="601" loading="lazy" alt="UFO over Pokhara"> <figcaption>The field in Batulechaur belonging to Kul Timilsina where fragments of a flying object fell from the sky in 1968.</figcaption> </figure>  One of them is Timilsina’s wife Gyanu, who was 22 at the time. She had been at home, and remembers hearing the big bang and the sky becoming very bright. “We saw the thing in the field in the morning,” she told us. “It looked like a lid, a covering of some sort. The way it was stuck in the ground, it must have fallen from the sky. We thought we could use it to dry clothes on, and took it home.”&nbsp; Another witness is Kul Narayan Paudel. “I was only eight then. We ran to the field to see what had fallen. It was a four-sided metal sheet. The elders took it away, and I don't know what happened to it.” &nbsp; Ram Bahadur Baniya, a teacher at the local school, says he had heard the sheet had been brought to the school, and later handed over to the Zonal Commissioner at the time, Nanda Prasad Malla. “But that is all hearsay,” he says.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2024120707128_0bf207a12063fb8155b3c8d9a00a94887b126380c9e0627527c84cf5e1101f54.jpg" data-media-id="editor_1" data-image-id="2024120707128_0bf207a12063fb8155b3c8d9a00a94887b126380c9e0627527c84cf5e1101f54" data-rendition-name="original" width="1170" height="610" loading="lazy" alt="UFO over Pokhara"> <figcaption>Gyanu Timilsina, wife of Kul Timilsina.</figcaption> </figure>  There are two versions of what happened to Kul Timilsina’s metal sheet. One is that an American Peace Corp Volunteer teaching at the nearby Bindyabasini School took it, and another is that it was handed over to the government. Recently declassified Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and US State Department documents from the time say that the US Embassy in Kathmandu tracked down the object two years later and had it shipped back to the US. A telegram from the Department of State and Department of Defense tagged as ‘MOON DUST / Space Fragments’ dated 1 March 1972 stated: ‘1. Restored space fragment will be on board Embassy support flight 115 arriving Kathmandu on or about March 10. Fragment is packed in shipping crate (cargo no. 72-33365) marked in care of DAO.&nbsp; 2. State and Defense representatives examined fragments prior to shipment finding restoration acceptable.’  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20241207071212_929d903ee06d41baa4f6040e981cd7c7d7bd75cc9c37c9b617d307fc8538d2df.png" data-media-id="editor_2" data-image-id="20241207071212_929d903ee06d41baa4f6040e981cd7c7d7bd75cc9c37c9b617d307fc8538d2df" data-rendition-name="original" width="856" height="568" loading="lazy" alt="UFO over Pokhara"> <figcaption>Declassified CIA documents about the investigation into the object sighted in Pokhara. </figcaption> </figure>  The documents show that the US government, military and intelligence agencies investigated this incident thoroughly when it occurred, and have continued to revisit it ever since, as recently as five years ago. What is even more intriguing is that the object that fell in Pokhara was not the only unidentified space object that fell to earth that year. There were similar sightings of objects falling from the sky in Ladakh, Sikkim and Bhutan between 19 February and 25 March 1968.&nbsp; These mysteries were the subject of a CIA investigation in 1968 titled ‘<a href="https://www.cia.gov/readingroom/docs/CIA-RDP81R00560R000100070007-8.pdf">Sighting of Unidentified Flying Objects in Ladakh, Nepal, Sikkim and Bhutan</a>’, and the report is part of the recent online declassification of 800,000 top-secret documents from the period.&nbsp; &nbsp;Although unidentified flying objects (UFOs) have a connotation now of being alien craft, it could be pieces of satellite, missile, rocket or even aircraft. The CIA report documents six sightings in 1968 and quotes local sources as describing all of them having similar characteristics: bright blue or red streaks in the sky accompanied by loud sounds like lightning and thunder and objects falling to the ground. Aside from the metallic object that was found in Batlechaur, there were other items also found nearby in Tallakot, Tureypasal, Armalakot and Maidan. Whatever the object was, it seems to have disintegrated even before it hit the ground.&nbsp; The CIA report records the first sighting on 19 February 1968 in various parts of Sikkim and Olangchung Gola and Ghunsa in eastern Nepal. The light was said to be ‘long and thin’ and giving out ‘green and red light’. &nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20241207071212_c3c825027d966a2aedc846970390eebe063957503c7eacc8e01e0517843f9bbb.png" data-media-id="editor_4" data-image-id="20241207071212_c3c825027d966a2aedc846970390eebe063957503c7eacc8e01e0517843f9bbb" data-rendition-name="original" width="892" height="596" loading="lazy" alt="UFO over Pokhara "> </figure>  Two days later on 21 February, a soundless blue object was seen traveling fast across the sky above Thimphu in Bhutan. Then on 4 March there were multiple daytime sightings or white streaks in the sky at Chang La Pass, Fukche and Koyul in Ladakh. There were more sightings in Ladakh on the very day fragments fell near Pokhara on 25 March 1968.&nbsp; After the sightings in Pokhara, rumours started flying in Kathmandu that these were aliens trying to land on Earth, it could be Russian or Chinese spy planes or satellites, and some even say it as a sign from heaven that the end of the world was near. This was at the height of the Cold War. The Russians and Americans were testing their thermonuclear devices as well as intercontinental ballistic missile delivery systems. The Washington-Beijing rapprochement had not yet happened, and China was making quick progress testing atomic bombs. Within two years after its first atomic test, in 1966 China exploded its first hydrogen bomb at the Lop Nur site in Xinjiang, 3,000km to the north from Nepal. After neary six decades, what is still intriguing is that all the sightings within a few months of each other in 1968 were along the Himalayan arc bordering Tibet: from Bhutan, Sikkim Nepal, to Ladakh. The US military intelligence seems to have concluded that this was not a coincidence and there were frequent research trips to the site in Pokhara by American officials in the months after the incident. With the help of the Royal Nepal Army, the region north of Pokhara was thoroughly searched.&nbsp; A confidential memo dated 25 June 1968 by Jerry C Trippy to a ‘Mr Farley’ mentions that the US Air Force’s Foreign Technology Division had decided that the debris could be important because it may be related to a Chinese missile test or a Soviet ‘Vehicle Venik’ rocket.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20241207071216_feb5425692dc36b20187de4e4fcc2ce9fd12b6d9e1b8724398e50bcdbf9032fe.jpg" data-media-id="editor_5" data-image-id="20241207071216_feb5425692dc36b20187de4e4fcc2ce9fd12b6d9e1b8724398e50bcdbf9032fe" data-rendition-name="original" width="1500" height="1000" loading="lazy" alt="UFO over Pokhara"> </figure>  On 28 August 1968 the US Embassy in Kathmandu sent a letter to Washington DC saying that the object could be of Soviet origin, possibly from when the rocket carrying the ‘Kosmos 208’ satellite re-entered the atmosphere. But why were the fragments falling to earth several weeks apart, and in the same region? No one knows where the metal sheet that Kul Timilsina recovered is now. It was definitely packed in a crate and taken to the US, and although it is rumoured that it was returned that is not very likely. Archivist Sunil Ulak heard from the Timilsina family that CIA officials had returned to the site five years ago. &nbsp; Interest in UFOs peaked in the US in the 1950s, with the Cold War space race and tests of atomic weapons and delivery rockets. CIA and scientists were being sent to investigate sightings, both publicly and privately. Could the Pokhara fragments as well as the sightings in Ladakh and Bhutan actually be alien craft falling to earth? The renewal in interest in space travel in large part due to Elon Musk’s SpaceX, UFOs and sightings are again subjects of public interest.&nbsp; Even 57 years later, even if there was definitive proof about whether the Batlechaur fragment was from a Chinese missile or a soviet rocket, it has not been made public in documents declassified so far. We may never know.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20241207071216_b6938795f40731e7657fd6dcbb3cf460a326186a15eb11d4f832f602201ff598.jpg" data-media-id="editor_6" data-image-id="20241207071216_b6938795f40731e7657fd6dcbb3cf460a326186a15eb11d4f832f602201ff598" data-rendition-name="original" width="642" height="320" loading="lazy" alt="UFO over Pokhara"> </figure>  Sunil Ulak speculates if the debris actually came from an American aircraft, perhaps on an intel mission upon China. “Which could explain why they were so thorough in collecting the fragments in Pokhara,” he says. But that still does not explain the multiple sightings weeks apart in 1968.&nbsp; Indeed, US military aircraft were at that time flying frequent night-time missions from air force bases in India to supply weapons to Khampa guerrilla camps in Nepal located north of Pokhara in Mustang. It could very well be that the Chinese shot down one such aircraft. The other sightings could have been contrails of US spy planes, or Chinese anti-aircraft missiles.&nbsp; There were quite a few developments regarding UFOs in 2024. In a US congressional hearing in July, former intelligence officer David Grusch claimed that the government had long been involved in a program to investigate and retrieve non-human craft crashes, and then try to reverse engineer them. However Grusch did not show any evidence.&nbsp; The UAP Disclosure Act of 2024 was signed into law by Joe Biden in December 2023. It plans to oversee the public disclosure of UFO information. However, there is a clause in it that prevents disclosure if it would cause threats to military defense, intelligence operations or foreign relations.&nbsp; It is unlikely that the declassified documents about sightings in the Himalayan will cause any real surprise about definite evidence of alien life even if it was found. It seems humanity will continue, at least for now, to wonder about curious lights in the sky and whether there is anybody out there.&nbsp;

UFO over Pokhara

When Rastriya Swatantra Party (RSP) president Rabi Lamichhane was arrested in October on charges of defrauding depositors of cooperatives, the party’s vice president Swarnim Wagle gifted him Fareed Zakaria’s book, Age of Revolutions.
Since then, Lamichhane has been shunted around from Kathmandu to Pokhara to Chitwan and back to Pokhara to attend police investigations and court proceedings. He was being flown to Birganj via Kathmandu on Buddha Air on Monday. There is another pending case in Janakpur.
Human rights groups and civil society have criticised the government for hounding Lamichhane with inhumane treatment that borders on physical torture. The two parties in the coalition, Nepali Congress (NC) and the UML, see Lamichhane’s RSP as a potentially formidable challenge to their power.
Even if the fraud charges against Lamichhane are true, the Nepali public is increasingly looking at the government’s actions through the police and courts as political vendetta.
Despite all the travelling, sometimes by plane and often by road at night, Lamichhane appears to be in high spirits, waving to supporters who often gather if they know he is going to be driven around. A social media video shows him giving high fives to fellow passengers on a recent flight to Pokhara.&nbsp;
In the past weeks, streets in Pokhara have erupted with parallel protests by Lamichhane’s supporters as well as depositors of cooperatives who lost their savings to the scam.&nbsp;
Although family visits are allowed, prison officials in Pokhara told Nepali Times that not many people visit Lamichhane these days. He added, “When he does get visitors, he asks them to bring him books.”
Lamichhane is currently Nepal’s most high-profile public figure in custody, and highlights the stark difference between how influential prisoners are treated compared to ordinary inmates.
There are six prison cells at Kaski District Police Office’s two-story detention centre, three on each floor. And while authorities pack prisoners into already overcrowded cells, Lamichhane has an entire room on the second floor to himself.&nbsp;
He has also been allowed to call his family every few days. Other prisoners are not permitted phone calls except for emergencies.
Meanwhile, Lamichhane’s former business partner Chhabilal Joshi, an ex-Deputy Inspector General of Police with whom he established his Gorkha Media Network, is in custody under the same charges in the prison cell next to him.
Lamichhane is accused of siphoning off depositors' money to the tv network in which he was part-owner and anchor. &nbsp;
Both Lamichhane and Joshi are able to buy food from the police canteen instead of being served the regular meal like other prisoners. Joshi has also given his statement to authorities in Rupandehi and Kathmandu for his alleged role in the scam. Lamichhane is yet to be presented in Kathmandu for questioning.
While he was in custody at the Kathmandu District Police Complex, Joshi expressed his desire to sleep in a police officer’s office, reportedly assuring authorities that he would not run away and he was entitled to certain facilities as a former officer of the law.
“He seemed to be under the impression that he is still a police officer,” says a source at the Kathmandu District Police. “We made it clear to him that as someone accused of a crime, he was not entitled to special treatment.”
Former ministers Balkrishna Khand and Top Bahadur Rayamajhi, and ex-home secretary Tek Narayan Pandey, who were arrested in connection with the fake refugee scam last year, were similarly housed in the offices of law enforcement officials instead of prison cells. Khand has since been released after six months in jail.
While there is no legal provision to keep high-ranking officials in separate detention centres when they are arrested, authorities granting them special facilities is not uncommon. Law enforcement officials say VIP detainees expect preferential treatment while in police custody.
Among those is former Kosi Province minister Lila Ballav Adhikari, who was arrested from Biratnagar on 10 November over his alleged involvement in human trafficking and brought to Kathmandu. Adhikari had flown to Japan without government approval with three individuals on 29 October to attend a cultural conference, but had been sent back to Nepal from Narita.&nbsp;
His three companions were arrested at Kathmandu airport upon their arrival, but Adhikari was able to exit unscathed from the VIP lounge. Adhikari had resigned as the Kosi Province Minister for Internal Affairs and Law when it became public that his companions had been taken into custody, and was himself arrested shortly after. He has since been cleared by the courts.
Throughout his detention, Adhikari was kept separately from other inmates. Senior Superintendent of Police (SSP) Basant Rajouri, head of the Bhadrakali complex, says that while there is no separate detention area for VIPs, some detainees are kept separately depending on the nature of their crime.
However, sources say that arrangements were made for retired judges and others to visit Adhikari frequently worked at the office of a Deputy Superintendent of Police (DSP) during his time in custody.&nbsp;
“He used to constantly pester the authorities to let him sit outside in the sun, and to be able to use the police officer’s shower area,” added an officer.
Adhikari was released on 25 November after the government prosecutor’s office decided not to charge him in a move that was seen to expose the government’s double standards.
Over at Kathmandu’s Dilli Bazar Prison, former Kist Bank CEO Kamal Gyawali emerges from his prison cell into the courtyard of the prison’s ‘Ka (क)’ block every morning with a thick book in his hands, ready to give his daily sermon.
With his long beard, Gyawali, who is serving a prison sentence for banking fraud, looks the part of a religious guru as he implores his rapt listeners to “walk the right path, abandon bad thoughts and turn to scripture and spirituality”.&nbsp;
Afterward, the attendees gather to discuss politics and current affairs. Inmates at his daily sermons at the prison include other high-profile detainees, including former MP Ichchha Raj Tamang, who is in jail for money laundering and cooperatives fraud, former joint secretary Chudamani Sharma, who was convicted of corruption, as well as NC leader Chandra Bahadur Lama and Krishna Bahadur Upreti of the UML both of whom are on trial for embezzling billions of rupees.
Victims of the cooperatives scam that former lawmaker Tamang was involved in have made trips to the prison and requested visits, but he has refused to meet with any of them.
“Tamang often complains that the state has prevented him from returning the money to the victims by locking him up,” says a police officer at the Dili Bazar jail.
“All you hear every day from the VIP prisoners is that they have been framed,” adds the officer. “No one admits that they were involved in misdeeds.”
But while most high-profile prisoners complain about prison conditions, one exception is former provincial lawmaker Deepak Manange, who is serving a sentence at Dilli Bazar Jail for attempted murder.
“He is the happiest prisoner here,” says a warden. “Unlike the others, he doesn’t claim to have been framed, in fact he doesn’t seem to care that he is in prison.”
Manange is detained in the ‘Kha (ख)’ block of the prison complex, which he renovated at his own expense. The block previously housed female prisoners, but Manange used his influence to transfer them elsewhere. He faces no shortage of visitors, who range from political leaders to people from the underworld.
Along with Manange, other well-known prisoners in this block include Nepal Telecom Managing Director Sunil Poudel, and former executive director of the Surakshan Printing Centre Bikal Poudel, who are serving time for corruption.
Former prisoners at Dilli Bazar prison include ex-ministers Khum Bahadur Khadka and Shyam Sundar Gupta, NC leader Ganesh Lama, Maoist MP Balkrishna Dhungel, Nagarik Unmukti Party leader Resham Chaudhary, as well as former IGs Ramesh Chand Thakuri, Om Bikram Rana, and Hem Bahadur Gurung.
Section 54 of Nepal’s Prison Act assigns each prison’s internal administration the
responsibility of governing its prisoners, which means the more favourable the jail management is, the more comfortable it is for prisoners.
Dilli Bazar prison has been the prison of choice for many high-ranking prisoners, especially those convicted of white collar crimes, due to its more accommodating administrators. The prison, which has the capacity to house 700 inmates, is also less crowded than other jails.
Anuj Bhattarai, spokesperson of the Department of Prison Management, says that there is no legal classification in Nepal for felons to be assigned prisons based on the nature of their crimes.
“That Dilli Bazar Jail has a higher number of prisoners convicted of crimes like corruption is most likely a coincidence,” says Bhattarai. “There is no provision for influential people to be able to choose where they will be incarcerated.”&nbsp;
Translated by Shristi Karki from the Nepali original published in himalkhabar.com

What Nepal’s VIP prisoners do in jail

If you were raised in Nepal, you must have picked up its unique set of vocabulary: आन्दोलन, चक्का जाम, बन्द, राँके जुलुस, आफ्नो मान्छे, हाम्रो दल, कर्फु and many more words connoting political protest.
We became familiar with the acrid smell of burning tyres, and eyes smarting from tear gas. And yet, everyone speaks of another revolution in the making. Not by desire, but by suffocation.
We heard speeches about नयाँ नेपाल, but the New Nepal never arrived. The governance system changed, but it did not reflect on people’s lives — except for those close to centres of power. The state is still unreachable and is not bothered about <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/matter-of-life-and-debt">victims of loan sharks</a>, cooperative scams and other injustices.
Politicians continue to speak in sound bites, but fail to deliver. They have mastered the game of pointing fingers towards an external enemy and convincing people that they are never at fault. The political narrative is so disconnected from the actual analysis of the problem that suffocation doesn’t go away after every revolution.
No genuine effort has been made to deliver at all, which is why there is a palpable sense of disillusionment in the air forcing us to seek another revolution, even if Nepal may not be able to afford it.
How has the current system successfully held power, even if the public is deeply frustrated? How is it that for three decades we continue to be led by the same faces, who have time and again, proved to us that they may be great politicians but not national leaders?
<a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/improving-internet-governance-in-nepal">My experience at the epicentre of politics</a> has led me to identify three cultures that have enabled political parties to keep a tight hold on power: acceptance, silence and dependency.
We accept things the way they are. We use fatalistic phrases like “नेपालमा यस्तै हो” or “नेपालको कानुन दैब जानुन”. While this resilience enables us to rise back up from devastating calamities, it is also a reason for our compliance with the status quo.
Despite so many ‘revolutions’ that have led to significant reforms, these phrases keep getting reinforced, to the point that the upcoming generations have made it their lingo.&nbsp;
This acceptance is not a symbol of law-abiding citizens, but citizens living in fear of those in power, unable to ask the whys and why-nots.
Innovation suffocates in this culture of acceptance of the status quo. This is manifested in remarks like “but we don’t have any laws for this,” or “we don’t have the capacity to implement this”. An innovator or entrepreneur therefore has to spend that energy to become a political lobbyist, often educating and convincing the bureaucracy.&nbsp;
Remember when locally assembled <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/banner/designed-and-made-in-nepal">Yatri motorbikes</a>, despite having willing customers, had to suffer to secure license numbers because of a lack of regulations? Instead of creating new laws, the government kept chanting the “We will promote Nepal-made goods” mantra, leaving entrepreneurs in a labyrinth of bureaucracy. The weight of acceptance of the law lies heavily on innovators. Fatalism is a tactic used by those in power to generate mass fear in society.
When we accept, we become silent. This is a pervasive phenomenon. We are trained to keep quiet, lest we ruffle feathers, burn bridges, or not get the help we need in future. We know, yet we don’t speak.
Read also: <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/bureaucratic-hurdles-in-researching-nepals-bureaucracy">Bureaucratic hurdles in researching Nepal's bureaucracy</a>, Daniel W Edwards
Here is one example: the 2021 census shows that the number of baby boys born for every 100 baby girls is 112. This is a clear indication of female foeticide because of boy preference in society.
Despite such horrifying realities, there is finger-pointing within the government between the Ministry of Health and Population with the Ministry of Home Affairs. At the citizen level, we know those who are involved in killing girls. Yet, we don’t speak up. The Nepal Medical Council reports state that despite this gender imbalance at birth, there is no indication of any action.
But why would anyone speak against one's own fraternity, no matter how vile the act is?
When we accept and keep quiet, we become dependent on those who yield power. From getting our government procedure completed on time to getting transfers, to accessing any of our legally protected rights as well, we are forced to depend on our networks of चिनेको मान्छे people we know by blood, village, relations, political affiliation.
The culture of dependency has been the established way in Nepal. If you drive a two-wheeler or four-wheeler, and you get into a small accident, you will be asked to sort it yourself, dialing up the most powerful person you know. It becomes a competition of who knows who.
Recently I was told that there were calls from the Ministry of Health and Population and another from the Prime Minister's Office for just one medical position in a private hospital. Each was pushing its own candidate. Guess which candidate got the position.&nbsp;
The dependency of people is not on the laws or the state, it is with people in power, a reliance on the network of somebody who knows somebody, including those not officially in power.
These cultures are deeply ingrained in our heads, and in society. Collectively they form a vicious circle that helps those in power to retain power. This is not the society we want to live in.
Then, what do we do as a collective to break away from this? How do we break away from the cultures of acceptance and silence that have created this dependency? What can we do to ensure that our children do not have to learn the jargon of आन्दोलन before they learn about the state?
These are the cultures political parties need to shed rather than use them to perpetuate their power. This is what <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/opinion/comment/an-alternative-to-alternative-politics-in-nepal">alternative politics</a> needs to be about.
Sumana Shrestha is a member of Parliament’s Education, Health and Information Technology parliamentary committee and represents the Rastriya Swatantara Party.

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