‘Do you want people to have access to telephony or do you want to fight corruption? If you want to fight corruption, these people will be completely cut off from information highway for the rest of their lives, okay, full stop. Make up your mind.’ British businessman and self-proclaimed ‘thought leader’ Mohamed Amersi sits across from The Guardian journalist Tom Burgis at his lawyer’s offices in London as he makes this matter-of-fact statement.&nbsp; Amersi was referring to the dealings of Nepali businessman and fixer<a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/news.php?id=776#google_vignette"> Ajeya Sumargi</a>, one of the many subjects of his 2024 book Cuckooland: Where the Rich Own the Truth. This is Burgis’ third book, and he weaves a fast-paced tale with investigative reporting to chart the deal-making career of Amersi in the global telecommunication industry. The investigation traces Amersi’s backroom deals with associates of Russian president Vladimir Putin to Gulnara Karimova, the daughter of an Uzbek dictator. Inevitably, Burgis follows the trail to Nepal where a former Maoist commander turned prime minister wants to strike a deal with Lars Nyberg of the Swedish-Finnish firm TeliaSonera to break into the emerging market. Burgis' account of Amersi’s dealings in Nepal begins with the<a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/if-birendra-was-alive-nepal-could-still-be-a-monarchy"> royal massacre</a> in 2001 and Gyanendra’s ascension to power. The new king stages a coup in 2005 and reimposes absolute monarchy, and on this new stage enters Ajeya Sumargi.&nbsp; Read also: <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/nepal-s-richest-man-in-the-pandora-papers">Nepal’s richest man in the Pandora Papers&nbsp;</a> Sumargi starts out a smalltime businessman in Hetauda but soon climbs into the circle of movers and shakers in Kathmandu. He is self-made and has made a vocation out of knowing the right people in right places.&nbsp; And the right person to know in Nepal’s new political landscape was Gyanendra’s son-in-law, for whom Sumargi becomes a fixer, ensuring he becomes indispensable. Eventually this leads into his foray into telecoms just as mobile telephony was making inroads in Nepal. But Nepalis are sick of the conflict that had claimed 17,000 lives and of an authoritarian king. A people’s movement in April 2006 <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/editorial/lost-decade-of-post-conflict-transition,2139">forced Gyanendra out</a>, and the Maoists were subsequently elected to a Constituent Assembly.&nbsp; By then Sumargi had switched sides and sidled up to Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal (aka Prachanda, the Fierce One) Both are pictured, above. He is soon cleaning up illicit funds the Maoists allegedly purloined from stipends meant for former guerrillas in UN-supervised demobilisation camps.&nbsp; Sumargi arranges luxury lodgings in Lazimpat for Dahal in a house purchased in the name of his sister-in-law. Sumargi’s proximity to power earns him a license for Hello Nepal.&nbsp; Enter: TeliaSonera, which at the time also owns and operates Kcell in Kazakhstan and Ucell in Uzbekistan, and Ncell which it acquired in 2008 in Nepal. At a meeting with TeliaSonera boss Lars Nyberg, Prime Minister Dahal suggests purchasing Hello Nepal to make the pesky issue of license renewal go away. Sumargi opens the doors. Telia Sonera opens its wallet. And Sumargi, says the book, coolly pockets $74 million from TeliaSonera’s acquisition of Hello Nepal. He greases the right palms, makes TeliaSonera’s problems go away, and prepares to become an additional $200 million richer.&nbsp; TeliaSonera’s operations in Uzbekistan unravelled after Swedish investigators found it had negotiated with the Uzbek president’s daughter Karimova to obtain licenses and frequencies in return for millions in bribes. Nyberg resigned, and the new management debated whether to pull out of Nepal too.&nbsp; Amersi is unhappy, Sumargi is livid and threatens to sue. Burgis writes that in the end ‘friendship prevails’-- Sumargi is compensated and TeliaSonera’s new directors bury the findings of the investigation into their Nepal operation. After the scandal, TeliaSonera rebranded itself as Telia and divested from Ncell, selling its majority stake to Malaysian conglomerate Axiata for $1.36 billion in 2016.&nbsp; Was Sumargi able to channel the ill-gotten wealth of Maoist leaders through his dealings with Amersi and Co, and if so, how much? Burgis is not able to tell: ‘Whether any of the riches Mohamed Amersi helped to guide towards Sumargi were shared with the Fierce One and the other Maoist leaders, I cannot definitively say.’ In any case, Sumargi offloaded the millions he made from the TeliaSonera deal to his offshore accounts, adding to his considerable wealth, as documented in a 2019 investigation by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) and Centre for Investigative Journalists Nepal (CIJ-N). Amersi, meanwhile, went on to speak at a University of Oxford event about tackling <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/editorial/nepal-s-corruption-carousel">corruption</a>. The irony is not lost. He is now among the major donors to the British Conservative Party, and rubs shoulders with the likes of Boris Johnson and King Charles. Much of the book is based on the author’s conversation with Amersi in 2023 at his lawyer’s offices, where he was invited by Amersi himself in order to ‘set the record straight’ after an ex-Conservative Party MP questioned his iffy financial dealings. In words that would prove to be more relevant than ever, Burgis writes . ‘Everywhere, the powerful are making a renewed claim to the greatest prize of all: to own the truth. The power to choose what you want reality to be and impose that reality on the world.’&nbsp; The footnotes in Cuckooland contain Burgis’ often derisive, wry commentary on Amersi’s indignant, expletive-laden interjections during his interviews. The footnotes are as interesting as the book’s revelations about Nepal’s crony communism. &nbsp; ‘Your agenda is biased against me, and so you are looking for skeletons,’ Amersi insists to Burgis during one of his tirades. ‘Write your book and you’ll see what happens to it,’ he says during another. The underworld that Burgis has shined his light on is bleak. The lines between <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/editorial/Kleptocracy-kills,3161">kleptocracy</a> and democracy are blurred, corruption runs rampant, and accountability and truth are lost to the wheeling-dealings that enrich oligarchs.&nbsp; Given the apathy and silence that has greeted the explosive revelations in Cuckooland, perhaps Nepalis would rather have access to telephony than fight corruption. &nbsp;&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20241220121232_6b15740b65e4feddfc0afc9972cbfcee1852b8442338be2d2d697dc2357c7727.jpg" data-media-id="editor_6" data-image-id="20241220121232_6b15740b65e4feddfc0afc9972cbfcee1852b8442338be2d2d697dc2357c7727" data-rendition-name="original" width="1136" height="702" loading="lazy" alt="Cuckooland"> </figure>  &nbsp;

Shristi Karki

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Nepal’s crony-Communism exposed

<h2>Gold Smuggling</h2>  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2024032205038_6ff436f3ca5399751402ff6a360edee752b303b526320ae6e8b248f109194db2.jpg" data-media-id="editor_0" data-image-id="2024032205038_6ff436f3ca5399751402ff6a360edee752b303b526320ae6e8b248f109194db2" data-rendition-name="original" width="700" height="600" loading="lazy" alt="Gold smuggling NT"> </figure>  On orders of Home Minister Rabi Lamichhane, police on Monday <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/editorial/nepal-s-corruption-carousel">arrested Maoist vice-chair and former House Speaker Krishna Bahadur Mahara</a> in Bhairawa while he was trying to escape to India. He is accused of involvement in smuggling 60kg of gold concealed in motorcycle brake parts from Hong Kong last year, as well as 9kg of gold concealed inside vape devices in December 2022. Mahara’s son Rahul has been in custody since last August.&nbsp; Police arrested customs officials, Chinese and Indian nationals, and middlemen involved in smuggling the 60kg, while a Chinese trader was detained for gold hidden in e-cigarettes. Police uncovered phone records of Mahara and his son apparently pressuring customs officials to release the seized gold. Other Maoists, including Finance Minister Barsaman Pun, former Speaker Onsari Gharti Magar, son of former vice-president Nanda Bahadur Pun Dipesh Pun, are also implicated in the investigation report. &nbsp; Dipesh Pun was found to be directly linked to Dawa Tsering, the Belgian national thought to be the mastermind behind gold smuggling, who was arrested again last week after being released earlier. &nbsp; Finance Minister Barsaman Pun and his brother are alleged to have been in touch with one of the people said to be directly involved in the smuggling. They are so far not under investigation.&nbsp; <h2>Baluwatar Land Grab</h2>  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20240322050312_a71c350eed753b8a19aec2925a051ed256b766167eabf6a9e7c13ecc93f289ea.jpg" data-media-id="editor_2" data-image-id="20240322050312_a71c350eed753b8a19aec2925a051ed256b766167eabf6a9e7c13ecc93f289ea" data-rendition-name="original" width="1300" height="800" loading="lazy" alt="Lalita Niwas NT"> </figure>  Almost 14.45 hectares of real estate in Baluwatar nationalised by the government was <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/here-now/crime-and-or-punishment-in-nepal">parcelled out to private owners by brokers</a> since the 1990s under the guise of returning it to Subarna Sumsher’s family. Former prime ministers, ministers, party leaders, bureaucrats, and land revenue officials are all said to have their hands in the honey pot. &nbsp;&nbsp; In 2023, the CIB recommended that the government prosecute those implicated, including former prime ministers Babauram Bhattarai and Madhav Kumar Nepal whose Cabinets allowed ownership of the land to be transferred to private entities. Senior UML leader Bijay Gachhadar was named, as was Bishnu Poudel of the UML who later returned a part of the property.&nbsp; Middlemen Ramkumar Subedi and Shobhakant Dhakal, Bhatbhateni Supermarket owner Min Bahadur Gurung, as well as officials of the Land Revenue Office were arrested for alleged involvement last year. Baburam Bhattarai and Madhav Kumar Nepal have been spared, and Bishnu Paudel cleared. <h2>Fake Refugee scandal</h2>  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20240322050312_aca19c77e73d7dc603a1bccad13565768e5facd09d2e53c1d17ede36ddb7ae57.jpg" data-media-id="editor_4" data-image-id="20240322050312_aca19c77e73d7dc603a1bccad13565768e5facd09d2e53c1d17ede36ddb7ae57" data-rendition-name="original" width="1200" height="600" loading="lazy" alt="Fake Bhutanese refugee NT"> </figure>  Reporter Devendra Bhattarai for the Centre for Investigative Journalism Nepal <a href="https://ekantipur.com/news/2023/03/27/167988439341418193.html">broke the story in Kantipur </a>in March 2023 about top politicians and bureaucrats in cahoots with human traffickers to provide Nepalis with fake refugee papers so they could emigrate to the United States pretending to be from Bhutan. &nbsp; The masterminds were said to be Keshav Dulal, adviser to former Foreign Minister Sujata Koirala, and Sanu Bhandari who worked with former Home Minister Bal Krishna Khand with then home secretary Tek Narayan Pandey.&nbsp; <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/news/rot-at-the-top">In May</a>, police arrested Khand as well as UML leaders Top Bahadur Rayamajhi and his son, as well as the son of UML vice chair Ram Bahadur Thapa. Those arrested implicated Arzu Rana Deuba, wife of former Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba, and Manju Khand, wife of Bal Krishna Khand. Both have denied the accusations and the CIB did not investigate them despite leaked tapes purporting to prove they were paid millions. Bal Krishna Khand was released on bail in December, while Top Bahadur Rayamajhi remains in custody.&nbsp; <h2>Cooperatives fraud</h2>  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2024032205030_e6ad30233ba5e8c2b399e069a927cd29e34843c363272424b25700af8fa9f69c.jpg" data-media-id="editor_7" data-image-id="2024032205030_e6ad30233ba5e8c2b399e069a927cd29e34843c363272424b25700af8fa9f69c" data-rendition-name="original" width="800" height="800" loading="lazy" alt="Cooperatives NT"> </figure>  Last year arrest warrants were issued for Galaxy TV co-founder and former chair of Suryadarshan Cooperative G B Rai for embezzling deposits to fund business ventures. Rai is also alleged to have misappropriated more than Rs1 billion from Supreme Cooperative in Butwal and other microfinance institutions in Chitwan, Birganj and Kathmandu. Rai is on the run.&nbsp; Home Minister Rabi Lamichhane was co-founder of Galaxy TV, and was also <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/editorial/skeletons-in-the-cabinet-k5x6py1v">accused of cheating cooperatives </a>to bankroll the media company he co-owned. Lamichhane has refuted all allegations and since becoming Home Minister again transferred Kiran Bajracharya, the CIB chief investigating the cooperative fraud case. Instead, he jailed Maoist vice-chair Krishna Bahadur Mahara for his reported involvement in multiple gold smuggling scams and appears to be going after big fish in the NC next.&nbsp; Dipesh Pun, son of former vice-president Nanda Bahadur Pun was arrested last week for his involvement in gold smuggling is also one of those named in the Supreme Cooperative fraud case. <h2>Bansbari Land Scam</h2>  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2024032205034_887d724962f9e585ff9bec4cabf5c5b444a9f42d9723c8d95d7c2d8b4f03bac9.jpg" data-media-id="editor_9" data-image-id="2024032205034_887d724962f9e585ff9bec4cabf5c5b444a9f42d9723c8d95d7c2d8b4f03bac9" data-rendition-name="original" width="500" height="500" loading="lazy" alt="Land scam Bansbari NT"> </figure>  In February, the CIB arrested Arun Chaudhary of CG Holdings over alleged involvement in the illegal acquisition of 0.51 hectare of the government-owned Bansbari shoe factory. His brother, Nepal’s richest man and NC MP Binod Chaudhary, was also questioned on Thursday. The land was transferred without government approval in 1986 to the Chaudharys' Champion Footwear which is defunct, but the assets are owned by CG Chandbagh Residency, which also runs a school on the land. The CIAA was investigating, but the CIB took over after an <a href="https://www.ukaalo.com/ukaalo-vishesh/221022-cg-possession-in-bansbari/360">investigative report by Deepa Dahal in Ukaalo</a>. &nbsp;

Heads Roll

Speaking at a program on the International Day against Corruption on 9 December in Kathmandu, Prime Minister Pushpa Kamal Dahal admitted that his government’s efforts to curb corruption “has so far been inadequate”.
It was ironic that the function was organised by the supposedly independent Commission for the Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA) which itself has been weaponized by politicians in power to keep rivals down, undermining the rule of law and the doctrine of separation of powers.
Indeed, 2023 is ending as the most scandal-ridden year in Nepali history with a new scam almost every week.
One could say the glass is half full because at least investigative journalists used a free press to expose these crimes, the police investigated and the court did put some guilty behind bars. But the list of graft, malfeasance, smuggling, bribery, kickbacks is too long.
Read also: <a href="https://nepalitimes.com/editorial/nepal-gets-gold-medal-for-corruption">Nepal gets Gold Medal for corruption</a>, Editorial
Government officials and human traffickers colluded to cheat nearly 800 Nepalis by promising them entry into the United States as fake Bhutanese refugees. Former home minister Bal Krishna Khand of the Nepali Congress and former deputy prime minister Top Bahadur Rayamajhi of the UML were among those arrested. However, on Thursday, the Patan High Court ordered the release Khand on Rs3 million bail.
But some innocents were also framed. Senior police inspectors probing the crime were transferred because the investigation was getting too close to the consorts of the powers that be. &nbsp;
The property surrounding the Prime Minister’s residence was parceled off to individuals by the real estate mafia with political patronage, no one has been charged. More than 100kg of gold has been seized from smugglers in the past six months alone. Only mules have been caught. &nbsp;
And just as PM Dahal was marking the first anniversary of assuming office this month, the Malaysian conglomerate Axiata exited Nepal after selling its 80% stake in Ncell to Spectrlite UK Limited registered to Singapore-based Nepali-origin businessman Satish Lal Acharya. A transaction of this magnitude could not have been pulled off without the involvement of top bureaucrats, regulators and politicians.&nbsp;
In a case of the fox guarding the chicken coop, the Cabinet’s ‘high-level committee’ to investigate the Axiata stake sale is chaired by former Auditor General Tanka Mani Sharma, who was himself implicating in absolving Ncell in a previous tax evasion case. &nbsp;
Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/editorial/losing-our-moral-compass">Losing our moral compass</a>, Editorial
“Any investigative body that is tasked to investigate corruption must be independent, have jurisdiction, and be made up of experts,” explains Padmini Pradhananga, president of the Nepal chapter of Transparency International. She adds, “Investigations are fig leaves to let the guilty off and demonstrate an utter disregard for the rule of law and the separation of powers.”&nbsp;
Dahal’s coalition partners have not spoken out about the telecom scandal, nor has the opposition UML. However, Gagan Thapa of the dissident faction in the Nepali Congress has said the Axiata sale would not have been possible without support from political and administrative leadership.&nbsp;
‘It would be shortsighted to assume that forming committees will solve this issue,’ Thapa wrote on X. ‘Those involved in this sale be they in government or outside, no matter which level, rank, or influence, must not be exempt from investigation and action.’
Nepal’s mainstream media reports have quoted credible senior government insiders as accusing party loyalists and relatives of PM Dahal as well as relatives of his coalition partner Sher Bahadur Deuba of involvement.&nbsp;
Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/news/in-a-federal-kleptocratic-republic-of-nepal">In a Federal Kleptocratic Republic of Nepal</a>, Shristi Karki
And precisely because such big fish may be involved, there is a danger this one will also fizzle out like the other scandals this year.&nbsp;
To be sure, figures including former ministers, government secretaries and dozens of others are behind bars. But more prominent people who have been named -- including the NC’s Arzu Rana Deuba and Manju Khand in the fake refugee scam, Maoist leaders Barshaman Pun, Onsari Gharti Magar, Nanda Kishor Pun, and Krishna Bahadur Mahara in the gold smuggling scandal, as well as former PMs Madhav Kumar Nepal and Baburam Bhattarai in connection with the Baluwatar land grab — have been unscathed. &nbsp;
Says Pradhananga: “The boundaries between those who are punishable for crimes and those who bear the responsibility of penalising them are blurring. This is a sign of a nation in crisis."
Nepal ranks 110th out of 180 countries in Transparency International’s Corruption Perception Index (CPI), with a score of 34 out of 100. This means that Nepalis themselves regard their government as being ‘highly corrupt’.
Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/editorial/the-tragedy-of-tek-nath-rizal-2g4dahmr">The tragedy of Tek Nath Rizal</a>, Editorial

The Year of Scandals

Politics, being the world’s oldest profession, has been honed into a fine art — and nowhere more so than in Nepal. What is less well appreciated is the contribution some of us presstitutes have made to elevate the stature and prestige of Nepali politics to the level it has attained at this point in time.What has also not got as much attention is the vital role that corruption has played, and continues to play, in politics. Without it the wheels of government would grind to a halt. After all, graft lubricates the rusty machinery of the bureaucracy, greases the process of deal-making, and allows the country to chug along despite being, for all practical purposes, a flailing state.Nepal’s consistently high ranking in the Ease of Doing Business Index is proof of the role that malfeasance has always played in allowing swift decision-making on iffy investment proposals, speeding up bargaining, demarcating a clear chain of command that goes right to the top, and enforcing a one-window policy that cuts through red tape to facilitate under-the-table transactions.However, now that Nepal is graduating from Least Developed Country status to a Last-but-not-Least Developed Country by 2025, we we will be bound by international treaties to clean up our governance apparatus. It is a pity that we have to fix what ain’t broke, but we will reluctantly have to find antidotes to corruption.To this task, we have to roll our loins and gird up our sleeves, and there is no room for competency. 2025 is only two-and-half years away, and time is of the essence if we are to move higher up in the Translucency International Index, even if it means bribing them to do it.By now, we have tried just about everything to stop corruption, but we have been half-hearted. We passed laws to outlaw bribes, and that just drove the business underground. We set up the CIAA, but had to investigate the investigators. We sent our taxmen on junkets to Singapore so they could learn a thing or two about clean government, but they returned with 3 duty-free bottles of Old Smuggler each, and bribed their way through the Metal Free X-ray machines at the airport. We gave them salary hikes, but that just jacked up their cuts.Now, with advances in genetic engineering, there is hope. Complete genome sequencing allows us to pinpoint the exact genes for greed. Politicians genetically susceptible to purloining public funds can now be detected before they stand for elections, and can be debarred from contesting public office.Also, since we have hit a dead-end on Covid vaccines, we might have better luck with getting the international community to donate anti-corruption vaccines so we can inoculate members of the executive and legislative branches, as well as the judiciary. The media will also be on the priority list for anti-corruption jabs, since we are a high-risk group at the frontlines.KleptoVax will come in 2 doses. The first one is an antidote to petty bribes, graft and general crookedness. The second dose allows the body to develop antigens against nepotism, cronyism and Maoism. It is only after 70% of politicians get inoculated  will they attain herd impunity.Since there is great demand for KleptoVax in neighbouring countries, the government will have to buy it directly from manufacturers. The delay is due to a dispute over a non-disclosure agreement on kickbacks.

The Ass

Anti-corruption vaccine for Nepal

<img width="1122" height="974" src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221109181112/636bdfe39c7e80680e083dc5jpeg.jpg" alt=""/>Going by official statistics, Nepal’s economy is doing splendidly. The economy grew at 2.27%, not bad considering that has been battered for the past eight months by Covid-19. Every expert had predicted that <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/business/remittances-from-nepali-workers-rise/" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.nepalitimes.com/business/remittances-from-nepali-workers-rise/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1604545529632000&amp;usg=AFQjCNGK8sRyj3qm0LozvU2GO_IyJ1rI7w">Nepal’s remittances would go down</a> with the pandemic, with the Asian Development Bank even putting a precise figure: a decrease of 28.7%. But it actually went up by 8.1% in July-September compared to the same months last year. Inflation is holding steady at 4.5% The balance of payments is Rs68 billion in the positive. Nepal’s hard currency reserves have hit a record-breaking $12.2 billion.The Ministry of Health’s statistics show that 1,004 people have died so far from the coronavirus. But the Nepal Army says it has cremated and buried more than 1,400, the mortality totals at hospitals do not add up, and no one has bothered to count those who have died during isolation at home. <a href="http://nepalitimes.com/banner/heat-map-of-nepals-covid-19-hotspots/">Heat map of Nepal's Covid-19 hotspots</a>, Sonia AwaleThe total number of positive Covid-19 cases in the country is now nearing 180,000, but the number is probably many times higher. That figure is just among those who tested. The Ministry of Health has an exact number for those who have recovered: 137,992. But who is counting those who have stopped quarantining? Since conclusions can be subjective, we rely on statistics to plan. But what if the figures are distorted or wrong? After all, statistics can be bent any which way to suit any argument.Economic indicators are designed for ‘normal’ times, not when the world goes upside down. Extraordinary circumstances need more than figures for GDP per capita and annual economic growth. National averages distort the reality: you could have one foot in the oven and another in an ice bucket and say that on average you are comfortable.Nepal’s macroeconomic picture may look rosy, but the ground reality is different. By themselves the numbers may be right, but they do not reflect the overall outlook for the economy. <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/nepal-plans-to-revive-economy-hit-by-covid-19/">Nepal plans to revive economy hit by Covid-19</a>, Nepali TimesEnterprises have gone out of business, millions have lost their jobs and sunk below the poverty line. Many middle class families have lost all their savings to pay hospitals for treating relatives with Covid-19. There are no official statistics on them.Official figures show that imports are down and the balance of payments is looking healthy, but domestic production is nearly zero. Pre-Dasain remittances may have gone up, but nearly 200,000 Nepali migrant workers are backlogged and have not been able to leave. Tens of thousands of workers and their families <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/here-now/nepali-workers-returning-to-india/" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.nepalitimes.com/here-now/nepali-workers-returning-to-india/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1604545529632000&amp;usg=AFQjCNFpY6UJSKIhLGjtjd7g88JkrA1jEA">have gone back to India</a> because of lack of jobs here, and paradoxically many Indian workers have streamed back to ply their trades in Nepal’s cities. It is the Central Bureau of Statistics that is supposed to keep track of economic activity, but its figures show that Nepal is not in an economic recession even though there are no accurate numbers for economic growth for the last two quarters to base that assumption on. The Nepal Labour Survey of 2018 shows there are 7 million people employed in Nepal, and of these two-thirds are in the informal sector. We have no idea what has become of them. We can only guess that most have no income, but there are no figures. You can only solve a problem if you know there is a problem.Pre-pandemic figures show 17% of the population living below the poverty line. <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/window-on-the-future/">Window on the future</a>, Nepali TimesInformally, economists estimate that one-third of Nepalis have now been pushed below the poverty line. But that is just a guesstimate. There are no surveys to show how many people from which sectors lost their income. Just like with Covid-19 tests and treatment, the government is telling citizens most at risk to fend for themselves.A 2016 Population and Health Survey showed that half of Nepal’s population suffered from food insecurity, with 10% of families facing chronic food shortage. Eight months into the pandemic, aside from sample surveys by <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/1-in-5-nepal-families-lack-food/" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/1-in-5-nepal-families-lack-food/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1604545529632000&amp;usg=AFQjCNHzz7kNirEL_KnmBTHv5B9qPY7dSA">WFP</a> and <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/covid-19-impact-on-food-and-school-in-nepali-children/" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/covid-19-impact-on-food-and-school-in-nepali-children/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1604545529632000&amp;usg=AFQjCNE37hdrJ6WrTiOAlU2rqUVObGhtNA">UNICEF</a>, we do not know for sure the scale of the nutrition crisis.Without these statistics, the already inadequate relief targetted for the most vulnerable will be side tracked by the politically connected. Which is what is happening. In the past eight years, the government has not even been able to identify the poorest families.Prime Minister K P Oli, preoccupied with a <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/nepals-communists-on-verge-of-split-again/" data-saferedirecturl="https://www.google.com/url?q=https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/nepals-communists-on-verge-of-split-again/&amp;source=gmail&amp;ust=1604545529632000&amp;usg=AFQjCNE9ukuEol_jqrw5C-QhBOoNcm8vJw">perpetual power struggle</a> with his party nemesis Pushpa Kamal Dahal, relies on incomplete statistics to declare that Nepal is not in an economic crisis. You cannot wake up someone who is pretending to sleep.Ramesh Kumar

Lies and damned lies

<img width="1229" height="717" src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221109151116/636bb6a49c7e80680e07bc74jpeg.jpg" alt=""/>A combination of rampant corruption, wayward planning, <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/news.php?id=16530#.X3RCOMIzaUk">donor interest</a> and an utter disregard for intended beneficiaries has delayed Nepal’s multilateral development projects, and wasted scarce resources. Infrastructure projects, poverty alleviation schemes, initiatives to improve education have all been leaking billions of rupees over the last two decades, and budgets are continuously disbursed despite huge costs over-runs and little progress. Middlemen, consultants, contractors, extortion and excessive employee benefits have diverted much of the money meant to uplift Nepal’s most under-served regions and people living there.The World Bank funneled Rs5.1 billion into the Project for Agriculture Commercialisation and Trade (PACT) was designed to improve the farming business and raise rural income. Instead, much of the budget was spent lining the pockets of middlemen and ‘fake farmers’, the World Bank’s own investigation found. The Bank has sent a letter to the government urging legal action against the perpetrators who siphoned off the money.Equally notorious is the Asian Development Bank (ADB)-funded High Mountain Agribusiness and Livelihood Improvement Project (Himali) with a budget of Rs2.62 billion. <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/economic-cost-of-5-months-of-nepal-lockdown/">Economic cost of 5 months of Nepal lockdown</a>, Nepali TimesLike PACT, Himali required farmers to submit written proposals to get access resources, when much of Nepal’s farming population is illiterate. As a result, proposal-writing rackets sprang up and fraudulent ‘farmers’ took away most of the money. Farmers who were genuinely in need were not even aware of the aid offer.“Projects in Nepal have been designed with the interest of donor disbursement quota in mind,” explains former secretary of the Ministry of Agriculture Suroj Pokhrel, “they do not take into account the government’s delivery capacity and the reality on the ground.”The School Sector Reform Plan (SSRP) funded by a consortium of donors spent a mind-boggling Rs3 trillion from 2009 to 2015, but most of it went to building facilities, with little attention to improving the quality of instruction. Without learning lessons from it, the government is now working with another donor-funded follow up: the School Sector Development Plan (SSDP).“Development assistance to Nepal will never benefit the target group if it does not take into account their fundamental needs,” says public policy analyst Suryaraj Acharya. “The prime motivation for development funds has been in the donors’ interest rather than the overall development framework of the country.”  <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/nepal-unveils-covid-19-budget/">Nepal unveils Covid-19 budget</a>, Nepali Times <img width="1492" height="763" src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221109151116/636bb6a69c7e80680e07bc75jpeg.jpg" alt="">Foreign assisted projects are also conditional on hiring expensive consultants for tasks that Nepalis with much more extensive local experience already have. The ADB and World Bank-funded agriculture projects spend up to a quarter of their entire budgets on consultants, a report has shown, with others spending even more. “Project costs are massively inflated by consultant fees, so there is very little trickling down to the target beneficiaries,” Pokhrel alleges. For example, the ADB-funded Melamchi Drinking Water project has spent a quarter of its budget on consultants, yet it remains incomplete two decades after work began. Bridge construction on the Mugling-Narayangad expressway also remains incomplete, even after spending Rs400 million on consultants. To be sure, <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/review/why-nepal-is-stuck/">official corruption that borders on extortion</a> within the Nepal government machinery is also to blame for the high costs and delays. But analysts say donors often get off the hook for their refusal to look at consultant fees driving up costs.Much of the leakage is also due <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/news.php?id=19592">to administrative costs and inefficiencies</a> within the Nepal government. Billions are spent on employee benefits, bonuses and expenses, but the projects get the green light from donors nevertheless.<a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/here-now/survive-2020-revive-in-2021-and-thrive-in-2022/">Survive 2020, revive in 2021 and thrive in 2022</a>, Alisha Sijapati<a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/save-farms-empower-farmers-nepal-citizens-appeal/">Agriculture and livestock development</a> has been a key area of aid for the World Bank, ADB and IFAD (International Fund for Agriculture Development). The Ministry of Agriculture has got help from them for the past decade to work on a dozen projects of which eight have been completed.Of those still ongoing, the Livestock Sector Innovation Project that is funded partly with a $80 million loan from the World Bank. Although agriculture is a vital sector of the economy, even the Agriculture Ministry’s own evaluation has shown that all the resources poured into increasing production have not yielded expected results. Better off people with political connections in the districts have benefited more than the really needy farmers.The World Bank has supported Nepal’s Poverty Alleviation Fund for the past 15 years, but a third of its budget was spent on administrative work, and the whereabouts of the remaining remains unknown. Some critics say much more poverty would have been alleviated if the cash was just doled out to the poorest Nepalis.<a style="outline: 0px;" href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/thinking-out-of-the-box-to-rescue-nepal/">Thinking out of the box to rescue Nepal</a>, Prem Jung ThapaAnother World Bank funded Rs5.17 billion project to improve food production and nutrition in the western mountains was also found to have benefited only a third of the farmers it was intended for. Documents obtained by Nepali Times show that 47% of the total budget for the 6-year Agriculture and Food Security Project was spent on administrators, consultants, and travel.  ­­Not only did the project not help <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/nepal-agro-imports-at-all-time-high/">subsistence farmers increase production</a>, most of the money got siphoned off by well-connected locals. It spent Rs 1.4 billion was spent just on training and workshops. Towards the end of the project, employees spent Rs20 million just on junkets to Vietnam, Korea and Australia. The report also show outright stealing from the procurement budget.In its own report, the World Bank declared PACT as a ‘moderately unsatisfactory’ project, which might have been a polite way of saying it did not deliver the goods. But no action has been taken on its conclusions. Vice-President of the World Bank’s Multilateral Investment Guarantee Agency Ethiopis Tafera concluded that there had been irregularities in the project’s financial records, but there has been no follow-up.<a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/a-covid-19-third-wave-in-the-third-world/">A Covid-19 third wave in the Third World?</a>, Ed HoltPokhrel says the only way out of <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/when-will-nepals-future-ever-arrive/">Nepal’s donor dependency syndrome</a> is to set up an Agriculture Projects Bank where Nepal’s aid agencies can pool their aid. However, he says donors have opposed the plan. He adds that donors try to replicate development models that have worked elsewhere, but they have not been successful in Nepal because the conditions here are different.Acharya is even more critical. He says Nepal has to break out of the habit of accepting aid for activities that the country is capable of carrying out itself. He does not agree with the oft-repeated excuse that projects failed due to poor implementation and not wrong policies. He says it is <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/nation/Knowing-how-to-ask-for-help,1348">faulty policy itself</a> that leads to poor implementation.Acharya supports the bilateral assistance models adopted by China, South Korea and Japan during their early phases of development. They required donor countries to help out in projects the governments themselves formulated as per their own long-term development strategies.    A former employee of the Finance Ministry’s Foreign Aid Coordination Department says: “In my whole career I have not seen a single foreign-funded project that has been completed in time, or has provided promised benefits.”

Aid rarely aids agriculture in Nepal

<figure><img width="800" height="910" src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221108121144/636a419d9c7e80680e04a685jpeg.jpg" alt=""/><figcaption>Illustration: DIWAKAR CHETTRI</figcaption></figure>Just when we thought everything necessary had been said about <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/editorial/trickledown-corruption,4176" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Nepal’s corrosive corruption</a>, it seems to be even worse. The idea that ‘corruption’ is a Rs100 note slipped under a table is now just a quaint notion. Today, a network of politicians, bureaucrats, the legislature, judiciary and private sector cartels plunder and loot from the people, dividing the spoils. The beauty of it: no one is caught.Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/?p=27016&amp;preview=true" target="_blank" rel="noopener">A klepto republic</a>, Editorial‘Corruption in Nepal is not a series of disjointed, individual acts. Instead, a range of stakeholders spanning public, private and criminal spheres operate as one to steal from the people and ensure impunity thrives,’ says a new report by the <a href="http://nitifoundation.org/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Niti Foundation</a>, Nepal’s Kleptocratic Network: Mapping Corruption and Impunity.  The network is one of shifting alliances spanning multiple agencies, with powerful businesses acting as brokers.<img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221108121144/636a41a09c7e80680e04a686jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="350" height="248">‘Money flows upwards through the hierarchy while impunity and benefits flow downward,’ adds the report. It uses flowcharts to show and shame politicians, political parties, public institutions and the private businesses. Read also:<a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/editorial/trickledown-corruption,4176" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Trickledown corruption</a>, Editorial <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/uncategorized/elected-contractors/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Elected contractors</a><a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/here-now/nepal-has-to-curb-corruption-before-wooing-investors/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Nepal has to curb corruption before wooing investors</a>, Ramesh Kumar ‘The private sector has gained primacy as the driver of corruption and impunity in Nepal ... its main roles are to distort the functions and policies of government regulatory agencies and to hijack key revenue streams to facilitate money laundering and rentier practices,’ the report concludes.In cahoots are political ‘patrons’ of the network and parties creating a ‘culture of collusion’, and public institutions, which also ‘collude with private interests and politicians to steal directly from the state’.State institutions have been ‘weaponised’ and ‘hollowed out’.So, who remains to protect the interests of the Nepali people? If you were thinking ‘the judiciary’, think again.The report states starkly: ‘Through pressure and threats, including sackings, impeachments, and forced retirements, political parties control and extract loyalty from justices.’

No shame

<img width="1400" height="1049" src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221108121144/636a41a19c7e80680e04a687jpeg.jpg" alt=""/>All of us witness examples of <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/news.php?id=17581#.XOS_jiAza70" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Nepal’s corruption pandemic</a> every day in every sphere of life: from slipping a few to get a driving license to setting land transactions. Roads that are dug up and not finished for years and bridges that collapse as soon as they are built are our monuments to malfeasance. Clever civil servants now deploy ‘brokers’ outside their offices to ‘facilitate’ state services that should be free, so they do not have to directly get hands dirty. Read also: <a style="background-color: #ffffff; font-size: 15px; letter-spacing: 0.01em;" href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/?p=27015&amp;preview=true" target="_blank" rel="noopener">No shame</a>But these are cases of petty theft by small fry. At higher levels of government, corruption is so huge and widespread, so accepted as SOP, that the word ‘corruption’ does not do justice anymore to this <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/editorial/crony-communism/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">contagion</a> of loot and plunder.One egregious example of the rot was the ugly scene in the Parliamentary Accounts Committee (PAC) on Tuesday when Nepal Communist Party MP Aman Lal Modi accused <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/here-now/how-they-kept-nepal-in-the-dark-ages/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Kul Man Ghising of the Nepal Electricity Authority (NEA)</a> of corruption. Ghising, many readers will remember, is the man who ended the practice of his corrupt predecessors of providing 24-hour power to industries in return for bribes. Nepalis did not suffer from load-shedding just because of undersupply but because of structural corruption —  <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/nation/corruption-in-electricity-industry-of-Nepal,3408" target="_blank" rel="noopener">top NEA executives were selling electricity to industrialists</a>, leaving household consumers in the dark for 10 years.<a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/interview/interview-with-Kulman-Ghising,3409" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Ghising</a> recently asked those industries to pay a backlog of dues for dedicated feeders, prompting Nepal’s so-called captains of industry to gang up on him. It does not take a Sherlock Holmes to figure out why MP Modi is using PAC to go after Ghising.Then there was the sordid affair of the <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/from-the-nepali-press/melamchi-delayed-by-government-extortion/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Melamchi contract</a>. The much-delayed $500 million project to bring water supply to Kathmandu Valley was nearing completion in December. A Dispute Resolution Board awarded the contractor Rs350 million for delays caused by the earthquake and Blockade in 2015, but a secretary in the Water Supply Ministry refused to sanction payment unless he got Rs50 million in kickbacks. The Italians abandoned the project, Melamchi is in limbo.To understand just how deep-rooted corruption in Nepal is today, a report issued this week by the <a href="http://nitifoundation.org/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Niti Foundation</a>, Nepal’s Kleptocratic Network: Mapping Corruption and Impunity, is an eye-opener. To be sure, none of what it contains should surprise us. We always knew rent-seeking was the modus operandi of the state, and politicians and bureaucrats were up to their necks in extraction and extortion. Such is the impunity, the big fish never get caught. <img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221108121144/636a41a49c7e80680e04a688jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="350" height="248">The report tries to show, not tell, just how nefarious, deep-rooted and interlocked rent-seeking is in Nepal. Illustrating graft with graphics, we are given flowcharts to explain why plunder and impunity is so systemic.‘Core state entities responsible for regulation and upholding rule of law have been weaponised or hollowed out by the kleptocratic network to extract resources and guarantee impunity,’ says the report. ‘The impunity network comprises those that declare law, enforce law and apply law.’The report lays bare how Parliament is infiltrated by special interest groups who are in key committees drafting legislation for sectors like education, health and infrastructure. There is no separation of powers anymore -- the powers-that-be control all three branches of government.The executive openly interferes in legislative functions, and tries to influence the courts with ‘bench shopping’. Those who stand in the way or try to expose the rot, like Kul Man Ghising, are themselves accused of corruption. The state is in open collusion with the private sector, which is now well represented in Parliament. The CIAA corruption watchdog is a lapdog of the state. Lack of transparency and impunity is rife in the security forces. The report has gory details of how ‘<a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/here-now/nepal-has-to-curb-corruption-before-wooing-investors/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">revenue capture’</a> works through collusion between officials in <a href="https://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/editorial/trickledown-corruption,4176" target="_blank" rel="noopener">all three levels of government</a> and contractors.The only remaining check and balance function is carried out by the fourth estate, hence the moves to try to censor its content through legislation. But even the media is used by powerful interest groups to target rivals or tar those who expose them.Everyone seems to be on the take: it is a public-private partnership to loot the country. ‘The private sector has gained primacy as the driver of corruption and impunity in Nepal … by distorting the functions and policies of government regulatory agencies and to hijack key revenue streams to facilitate money laundering and rentier practices.’  The Niti Foundation report makes for thoroughly depressing reading, and what it lacks is a roadmap out of this morass. Our only hope is in a transparent and fair electoral process that will one day punish thieves and reward the honest by electing them to office. <img width="1282" height="919" src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221108121144/636a41a59c7e80680e04a689jpeg.jpg" alt=""><h2>10 years ago this week</h2> The Nepali Times <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/issue/452" target="_blank" rel="noopener">edition #452 of 22-28 May 2009</a> was filled with analysis of the politics post-resignation of Pushpa Kamal Dahal over the Army Chief sacking. The Ass had his own take on the matter, and except for GPK, the cast of characters are the same in this excerpt from the <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/news.php?id=15961#.XOaeC1IzaUk" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Backside Column ten years ago</a>:‘Rate we are going, the new federal constitution of Nepal is looking more and more like a mirage. The closer we get to it, the more it recedes. The prolonged coalition-cobbling is reminiscent of mid-1990s. And it’s the same old faces.BijayG being pulled by both arms to switch sides when Upadro refused to toe the line. The only difference with 15 years ago is that this time the entire exercise is outsourced to Lainchaur. And the sight of both GPK and PKD courting Kamal Thapa for royalist support just shows how quickly fortunes turn in politics.And even the bigger parties are out to feather their nests. One senior NC leader, when asked by the Ass if he would be joining the Makunay-led govt, said: “You think I’m stupid to join a sarkar that will last three months? I will join the one formed after this.” <img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221108121144/636a41a89c7e80680e04a68ajpeg.jpg" alt="" width="800" height="1270">

A KLEPTO REPUBLIC

Not everything happening in Nepal is bad. If you just looked at the glass as half full, the news that Nepal has dropped another two notches to now rank #124 among the most corrupt countries in the world is in fact the best news we’ve had so far this year.Corruption is good for business, it spreads the wealth around through an alternative tax regime, it greases the system so the bureaucracy moves faster, it raises Nepal’s GDP. Without corruption this country would grind to a halt.What’s that? Didn’t quite catch you. You are saying that the country is already at a standstill, how can it grind to a halt? That is exactly the problem with this country. It is full of cynics like you. Don’t blame corruption for the country’s stagnation, how can we get anywhere if we still have honest cops who refuse to let you go on a traffic violation even if you offer them a cash incentive?Then there are tax officials at the airport who stubbornly insist on confiscating the extra bottle of whiskey you brought from Bangkok, and to rub salt on the wound, they give you an official receipt for it. And there are ministers who want to actually punish bureaucrats extorting money from contractors on National Pride Projects instead of rewarding them. How will this country ever attain Middle Income Status at this rate?Finally, we are able to get Don Manange sworn back into Parliament. Populating our federal legislature with members of the mafia, representatives of crime syndicates, cartel owners, the medical-industrial complex, knaves, goons, and mass murderers is the only way we can have a can-do law-making body that will restore Nepal as the proud and glorious nation it once was.Instead of banning corruption we must find ways of making it work in the national interest. One way to do that is to make malfeasance contribute to Nepal’s macro-economic stability by taxing vice. A service surcharge on graft and bribes would help us redress Nepal’s balance of payments deficit so we can hit the 7.8% growth target for fiscal 2018-19.Once we legalise corruption, we will become more transparent as a nation. Every time someone from the Ministry of Poultry and Livestock pilfers from the coffers, or a tycoon passes out a hefty baksheesh they will be slapped 13% VAT on the spot.Investors keen to start joint ventures in Nepal can be given a one-year tax holiday on all bribes they have to pay to lubricate the labyrinths of officialdom. Foreign diplomatic missions and international agencies, will of course have duty-free status, since their presence in our country is governed by the Vienna Protocol.

Transparently corrupt

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

Four international names in architecture, Shigeru Ban, Rem Koolhaas, Tadao Ando and Louis Isadore Kahn, all left their mark in Nepal. But despite their best intentions, the ambitious designs fizzled out. Ban, Koolhaas and Ando won Pritzkers, the best known international award for architecture, and Kahn could have won it had the prize been given in his lifetime. But their designs fell short of transforming Nepali architecture and did not help inspire local architects.&nbsp; Why were these four ‘starchitects’ unable to pull off their Nepal projects and enrich the country with exemplary contemporary designs? The failure, especially the violation of Kahn’s design, also raises larger questions about how much contemporary architecture is valued in Nepal.&nbsp; Whereas Sri Lanka had Geoffrey Bawa and Bangladesh had Mazharul Islam, the pioneers of contemporary architecture in Nepal have had far less public appreciation. One wonders if Nepali architecture only refers to the monuments and heritage of the past. Nepal does have examples of outstanding modern architecture such as the &nbsp;पाङ्रे घर ‘Wheel House’ and खुट्टे घर &nbsp;‘House on Legs’ by Shankar Nath Rimal in the 1960s. These are the best examples of how some Nepali designers successfully tailored modern architecture to the Nepali context.&nbsp; Ten years ago, Nepal had three architecture magazines, SPACES, praXis and Business Architecture, but none of these survived. This newspaper has prominently covered contemporary architecture, and the built environment, but these are exceptions in Nepal’s media. There have been a few encouraging signs. The 2024 exhibition Modern Encounters in Architecture in Kathmandu Valley (1945-1985) at the Taragaon Museum had many visitors and its accompanying book is a seminal document.&nbsp; In 2023, the Mountain Architecture Dialogue (MAD) that focused on examples of good-practice sustainable contemporary architecture for the mountainous terrains of Nepal was a packed event with over 300 young architects, engineers, environmentalists and architecture students. <h2>Shigeru Ban</h2>  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2024122003128_8bb8dde080c5698c2585966bef27ce4c08e4ee488d3432b2caac98b9de762dfe.png" data-media-id="editor_0" data-image-id="2024122003128_8bb8dde080c5698c2585966bef27ce4c08e4ee488d3432b2caac98b9de762dfe" data-rendition-name="original" width="990" height="1074" loading="lazy" alt="Forgotten international starchitects in Nepal NT"> </figure>  Shigeru Ban had already built a name for himself in post-disaster construction when he came to Nepal following the 2015 earthquakes in which 500,000 people lost their homes. The basic design and its 3D-rendered images were reviewed in upbeat articles on DOMUS, Architectural Review, Dezeen, and Arch Daily.&nbsp; But his signature cardboard tubes could not handle the monsoon and the roof structure had to be re-designed with timber. Only two shelters were completed in Sindupalchok, and only one of them still stands at the Hyatt Regency grounds today, as Ban’s souvenir to Nepal.&nbsp; <h2>Rem Koolhaas</h2>  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2024122003128_58afec9b57accfa38327af0936648c6eb2f2e11ff18f1af8ca27383dc57dc222.png" data-media-id="editor_1" data-image-id="2024122003128_58afec9b57accfa38327af0936648c6eb2f2e11ff18f1af8ca27383dc57dc222" data-rendition-name="original" width="750" height="722" loading="lazy" alt="Forgotten international starchitects in Nepal NT"> </figure>  The designs of Dutch architect Rem Koolhaas have a specific signature: bold shapes and an intriguing architectural typology that challenges standard building blocks. Some designs even seem to defy gravity, like the CCTV headquarters in Beijing: an angular, continuous geometry of glass and steel.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20241220031216_a18dc8a8d6b97bc6fa9d590036cf374f9dc3709c699fe5c5787304bbd05cb17d.png" data-media-id="editor_2" data-image-id="20241220031216_a18dc8a8d6b97bc6fa9d590036cf374f9dc3709c699fe5c5787304bbd05cb17d" data-rendition-name="original" width="1812" height="1168" loading="lazy" alt="Forgotten international starchitects in Nepal"> <figcaption>Rem Koolhaas' design for Ullen's School in Khumaltar.</figcaption> </figure>  Koolhaas was commissioned by Belgian billionaire Guy Ullens to design a new building for Ullens School in Khumaltar. The most prominent feature is its vertical glass block staircase. Some interior spaces have lowered windowsills, which provide ample views and daylight. But the school building has gone unremarked in Nepal. <h2>Tadao Ando</h2>  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20241220031212_cc16bd6feb8be07a7198285b847a45d2126dc3a479e0cc7370331861fc544675.png" data-media-id="editor_3" data-image-id="20241220031212_cc16bd6feb8be07a7198285b847a45d2126dc3a479e0cc7370331861fc544675" data-rendition-name="original" width="626" height="628" loading="lazy" alt="Forgotten international starchitects in Nepal"> </figure>  Doctors providing aid to victims of the Great Hanshin earthquake in 1995 in Japan requested Tadao Ando, who had donated his Pritzker money to the victims, to also make a design for a hospital in Butwal.&nbsp; Ando’s contribution would be pro-bono and the construction was funded by the Hanshin Earthquake victims and by the popular Japanese newspaper Mainichi, as a tribute to Nepali doctors. The first block that Ando designed for the Siddhartha Children and Women’s Hospital (SCWH) was the out-patient department. He quickly realised that he would not be able to pull off structures with his typical style of smooth-finished, high-quality concrete.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20241220031216_73ec0950d52320277ccc81d4a66fa6aa6acb38141e7b7633683e4cf8179dc579.png" data-media-id="editor_4" data-image-id="20241220031216_73ec0950d52320277ccc81d4a66fa6aa6acb38141e7b7633683e4cf8179dc579" data-rendition-name="original" width="1594" height="958" loading="lazy" alt="Forgotten international starchitects in Nepal"> <figcaption>Tadao Ando's Siddhartha Children and Women Hospital in Butwal.</figcaption> </figure>  Ando wrote in the online architectural catalog Architectuul, that the two main problems with the project were costs and the availability of local technology. ‘It became a facility that has a slightly different expression from the buildings I have completed so far,’ he wrote. He designed a colonnade for the west façade that would provide shelter from harsh sunlight, and the exposed brick walls were locally manufactured bricks.&nbsp; The hospital is characterised by modernist cuboidal massing, but the outer brick façades now appear unintentionally badly weathered by monsoons. The interiors lack both sufficient natural light and natural ventilation. <h2>Louis I Kahn</h2>  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2024122003128_612e199d62fb3e72b6b8f6a936b0fa0451d8c0aa3d831c071320bf423ee3d67f.png" data-media-id="editor_5" data-image-id="2024122003128_612e199d62fb3e72b6b8f6a936b0fa0451d8c0aa3d831c071320bf423ee3d67f" data-rendition-name="original" width="694" height="926" loading="lazy" alt="Forgotten international starchitects in Nepal NT"> </figure>  American architect Louis I Kahn had experience of projects in South Asia, and several were under construction when he died suddenly in 1974. Amongst these were the National Assembly complex in Dhaka, the Indian Institute of Management in Ahmedabad and the Family Planning and Maternal Child Welfare Centre in Kathmandu.&nbsp; Kahn had started the USAID funded project in Nepal by developing a master plan for the government institutional zone in Kathmandu, which included a building for the Health Ministry. The building’s façade in exposed brick has deeply recessed vertical windows for shading.&nbsp; The balancing of accentuated horizontal lines in the brickwork with the verticality of the larger composition is the work of a master. The brick walls rise up into punctured parapet walls at the roof level. These square apertures ‘frame the sky’.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20241220031216_69c2e4972dbe38773e0a3a3f1129485c9c87033ee84cd454e24ae0dc772d05cf.png" data-media-id="editor_6" data-image-id="20241220031216_69c2e4972dbe38773e0a3a3f1129485c9c87033ee84cd454e24ae0dc772d05cf" data-rendition-name="original" width="1924" height="1242" loading="lazy" alt="Forgotten international starchitects in Nepal"> <figcaption>Louis Kahn's plan for the Ministry of Health.</figcaption> </figure>  When Kahn died, only the eastern half of the building was finished. The Western part was never built and Nepal’s bureaucrats decided that without paint, the exposed brick façade was not finished. Then in 1995, citing roof leakage and a space crunch, the Health Ministry added a floor.&nbsp; The frames-to-the-sky in the roof parapet were converted into windows and topped off with a sloping roof of corrugated steel sheets, whose only virtue was that it was cost-effective.&nbsp; Kahn’s orthogonal composition, which clean horizontal and vertical lines, was desecrated despite a public outcry and legal challenges from architects and cultural organisations. A version of this article was first published in HIMAL Southasian. Illustrations by Varun S Bapu.

Forgotten international starchitects in Nepal

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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