<figure><img src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/2022111413118/63722ff89c7e80680e0c2541jpeg.jpg" alt="" width="1500" height="1000"/><figcaption></figcaption></figure>With federal and provincial elections barely three months away, Nepal’s leaders are flirting with regional powers, and exhibiting political promiscuity by switching sides and forming new alliances.Maoist Centre leader Pushpa Kamal Dahal has made no secret of his intention to succeed Sher Bahadur Deuba as prime minister after November, and has been trying to ensure that his project has the green light from Beijing and New Delhi.Just days after he met the visiting head of the International Liaison Department of the Communist Party of China (CPC) Liu Jianchao in Kathmandu, the Maoist chair jetted off on a previously unannounced visit three-day visit to India at the invitation of India’s ruling BJP.Dahal has been prime minister twice since the end of the conflict in 2006, and he has been forging party-to-party ties with both the CPC and BJP to assure the rulers of China and India that whatever the past, he will be a reliable partner.“It is clear that he (Dahal) is impatient to be prime minister again, so he is pulling every lever for his political longevity,” explains political analyst Puranjan Acharya. “He was probably clarifying his position to Liu during their meeting in Kathmandu, and then immediately went to New Delhi to placate Indian leadership.”Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/editorial/geopolitical-tug-o-war-over-nepal/">Geopolitical tug-o-war over Nepal</a>, EditorialThe CPC delegation also met Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba, President Bidya Devi Bhandari, Foreign Minister Narayan Khadka, Unified Socialist chair Madhav Nepal, as well as opposition leader KP Oli.The Chinese may have carried back the message that full Communist unity may not be possible before the November election, but having a ’Maoist’ prime minister may not be such a bad idea.The Chinese tried unsuccessfully to mediate in the power struggle between Oli and Dahal last year in a bid to keep the Nepal Community Party intact. They also failed to stop the ratification of the US-funded MCC infrastructure project, and believe Deuba to be West-leaning.Dahal’s visit to India was said to have been at the invitation of BJP president Jagat Prakash Nadda, and Dahal insisted at a press briefing at Kathmandu airport that the trip had been planned months in advance.Analysts say that while his meetings with the Chinese delegation was par for the course for a foreign delegation visiting Nepal, Dahal's visit to India on such short-notice was unusual.Dahal met with Indian External Affairs minister S Jaishankar, and National Security Advisor Ajit Doval, and with Nadda at the BJP headquarters. But Dahal, who had hinted at a breakthrough meeting with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, flew home without having one.Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/planting-seeds-of-democracy/">Planting seeds of democracy</a>, Shristi KarkiDahal’s visit to Delhi coincided with the presence there of Arzu Rana Deuba, NC leader and the wife of Prime Minister Deuba. The timing raised eyebrows in Kathmandu, and especially after he said in an interview that there was a pact with the NC to take turns being prime minister after November.Dahal insisted that the timing of the visit was a coincidence, and it was also significant that immediately after his return he met with Baburam Bhattarai, freshly ousted from his JSP. The former Maoist comrades have apparently been discussing the formation of a ‘socialist front’ for November.Although an electoral alliance with the UML seems unlikely, Dahal has also met Unified Socialist chair Madhav Kumar Nepal, Jhala Nath Khanal and Bamdev Gautam of a new left party to discuss an electoral alliance.“K P Oli stands in the way of a leftist alliance, and if he extends even the hint of an invitation, nobody should be surprised if Dahal dumps the Congress and jumps at the chance of leading a Communist super-alliance," says Acharya.Dahal’s meeting with leftist leaders comes on the heels of Babu Ram Bhattarai’s expulsion from Janata Samajwadi Party’s Central Committee by party chair Upendra Yadav on grounds of Bhattarai ‘engaging in activities to divide the party’. Eight other leaders from the Bhattarai camp were expelled alongside him, which Bhattarai called ‘arbitrary’ in a statement.Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/editorial/deubas-mixed-report-card/">Deuba’s mixed report card</a>, EditorialYadav and Bhattarai had fallen out after the party’s poor showing in the May local election. "By now, it is apparent that party-building is not Babu Ram Bhattarai’s forte. Every party he has established has ended up in instability due to trust issues within leadership,” says Acharya. “His political future will be safer— and his political expertise and knowledge can be much better used to help the nation— if he directs his attention to playing an active supporting role in an already established party as opposed to trying to form a new one."Meanwhile, in the NC the rift between Deuba and leaders like Gagan Thapa and Shekhar Koirala is widening as the two have decided not to engage in a power sharing deal if the coalition wins a majority in the upcoming elections. This would mean that the NC would hold prime ministership for a full term after the elections.Experts say it is clear that the decision of the NC to not pursue a power sharing deal is a result of the pressure on the prime minister from those outside Deuba's camp within the party.“The NC’s decision has foiled Dahal’s plan, and he will now actively pursue a leftist alliance or a socialist front. But he has continued to say that any such alliance will not hinder the coalition in any way, so as to placate the NC,” says Acharya.The NC’s Shekhar Koirala says his party made a mistake by encouraging its cadre to support other parties to the detriment of its own interests. He says: "We are discussing electoral alliances, but it should be done in such a way as to minimise losses for our party.”Dahal, meanwhile, has been coy in interviews about his prime ministerial ambitions. It is clear he is impatient to lead the country once more, and he is trying to make sure that domestic dynamics and regional geopolitics will be conducive.Read more: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/latest/nepals-local-polls-a-rehearsal-for-federal-elections/">Nepal’s local polls a rehearsal for federal elections</a>, Shristi Karki

Shristi Karki

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Pre-poll calculations

In what must be the biggest political tamasha in seven decades of Nepal’s communist movement, the UML and the Maoists formally merged on Thursday to create the Nepal Communist Party (NCP)The union was formally announced at a press meet in Kathmandu after registering the new party at the Election Commission. This is now the most powerful party Nepal has ever had with 174 seats in the 275-member Parliament, and can comfortably rule the country for the next five years. It can also amend the Constitution if one of the two Madhes-based parties backs it, to take the combined strength to two-thirds.Leftist analyst Shyam Shrestha thinks the NCP is now one of the most powerful communist parties in the world: “Only China and Vietnam have communist parties more powerful than the NCP, there is reason to celebrate.”The opposition Nepali Congress, which was the first elected party in Parliament in 1960 and governed Nepal for most of the period after democracy was restored in 1990, will now be further weakened. It has accused the united Left of dragging the country to communist authoritarianism. Shrestha disagrees: “We are living in a modern democracy where dictatorship cannot thrive.”Shrestha is upbeat that the emergence of a strong political force has <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/regular-columns/Comment/a-stable-nepal-in-2018,1090">effectively ended</a> an era of political instability in Nepal. The <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/nation/a-two-party-state,3968">unity drive was first announced</a> before elections last October, but ran into trouble over power-sharing and leadership issues after the alliance swept polls. <figure><img width="640" height="960" src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221107101156/6368d6b59c7e80680e03149djpeg.jpg" alt=""/><figcaption>Pic: Gopen Rai</figcaption></figure>After <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/blogs/thebrief/2018/02/15/oli-once-more/">UML Chair K P Oli was sworn in as Prime Minister in February</a>, Maoist leader Pushpa Kamal Dahal began lobbying for a ‘respectable’ presence of his comrades in the unified party. ‘Respectable’ was a code for Dahal’s demand that he should lead the united party, be prime minister in two-and-half years after Oli, and all positions should be divided 50-50.Read also: <a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/article/editorial/two-horse-race,3960">Two horse race</a>, EditorialWhen Oli became too busy with Indian Prime Minister <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/banner/a-modi-fied-oli/">Narendra Modi’s visit last week,</a> negotiations stalled. Dahal suspected Oli was no longer interested in unification, and was wooing the Madhesis. The Maoists even boycotted some of Modi’s events. But a two-hour meeting between Oli and Dahal on Wednesday cleared the air, and they hurried the unification process, timing the announcement for the 25th anniversary of the death of charismatic UML leader Madan Bhandari in a car crash. <figure><img width="1500" height="902" src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221107101156/6368d6b79c7e80680e03149ejpeg.jpg" alt=""><figcaption> </figcaption></figure>The other hurdle was semantics: finally, the UML accepted the Maoist-led ‘<a href="http://archive.nepalitimes.com/news.php?id=6187#.Wv2OAe6FPIU">People’s War</a>’ and Maoists agreed to the UML’s ideology of ‘People’s Multi-Party Democracy’. It is not clear if Oli promised to help Dahal in the first general convention of the unified party, or to relinquish prime ministership halfway through his term. The new party’s Standing Committee has 43 members (25 from UML and 18 from Maoists) and 441 Central Committee (241 from UML and 200 from Maoists).Ex-Maoist Ganesh Shah says Dahal’s brief to his comrades about unification was unusually brief: “He did not talk much, he just told us how party committees will be formed, he may have been under pressure to push the unification.”Read also: <a href="https://www.nepalitimes.com/here-now/a-political-pilgrim/">A political pilgrim</a>, Om Astha Rai <img width="1920" height="1280" src="https://superdesk-pro-c.s3.amazonaws.com/sd-nepalitimes/20221107101156/6368d6ba9c7e80680e03149fjpeg.jpg" alt="">

One body two heads

‘One early morning, we heard the ambassador’s wife cry out, “Ram, Ram, Ram!” A disaster has befallen Nepal!” She had heard on the radio that a fire had consumed Singha Durbar." This is not about the arson attack on 9 September 2025, but the one on 8 July, 1973. It started in the South Wing of the then single-largest building in all of Nepal. It took two days to bring the blaze under control, requiring the use of explosives to demolish one wing to protect the imposing western facade. As Bhekh Bahadur Thapa recalls in the English translation of his memoir A Life in Public Service: Nepal from Autocracy to Democracy, he was then on leave from the Nepal government serving with the IDRC in Ottawa.&nbsp; He had already served as Nepal’s Finance Secretary at age 25, went on to be Finance Minister and Governor of Nepal Rastra Bank. He was already younger than some of the GenZ ministers in Nepal’s present RSP government. Thapa, now 89, was at the launch of the book in February which was attended by former diplomats and bureaucrats. After speeches by panelists, there was a question from the audience about how Thapa had managed to be the diplomat he was, managing Nepal’s international relations on the world stage.&nbsp; Writer and journalist Akhilesh Upadhyay, who was moderating the panel, responded by going into the section of the book where we see Thapa as an ambassador to the US, playing tennis with White House officials, cultivating a network of contacts to project the identity and welfare of Nepal, and making it possible for a state visit by King Birendra to Ronald Reagan’s America. The book is full of anecdotes that suggest Thapa was a clever and strategic diplomat, always calm and unruffled, easily making friends in high places with his maturity and engaging sense of humour. Thapa’s memoir is heavy on details about Nepal’s administrative history during the years he was active in public service, serving as minister and ambassador under three kings: Mahendra, Birendra and Gyanendra, and alongside five prime ministers.&nbsp; Aside from an insider look on how certain treaties, development deals and research projects in Nepal came into fruition, Thapa goes into great detail about his personal and professional relationships with the kings, ministers, ambassadors, foreign leaders and politicians.&nbsp; As a reader, one is struck by the level of detail around the events that unfolded in Nepal over the years during Thapa’s tenure. Was Thapa recording a journal over the years of the events and the conversations that transpired, or were they committed to his phenomenal memory? Either way, the reader gets a glimpse of Nepal’s recent history from the early days of the Panchayat, through the People’s Movement and the democracy period, the Maoist insurgency, Royal Palace massacre of 2001, and Gyanendra’s coup of 2005.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/2026041204048_125dc8ae300a1e33124f394abe724d42727f83e067b0201d2008b58d60c459a4.jpg" data-media-id="editor_0" data-image-id="2026041204048_125dc8ae300a1e33124f394abe724d42727f83e067b0201d2008b58d60c459a4" data-rendition-name="original" width="1584" height="1000" loading="lazy" alt="How to win friends and influence nations NT"> </figure>  Not enough is said about the political parties of the time whose presence led to the way Nepal’s multiparty democracy came to be shaped. The book keeps its focus on the administration and the key figures around it, mostly those in the Panchayat era. Towards the second half of the book, we do start to hear about political parties, but not in great depth. Another figure whose presence in the book is conspicuously less prominent is that of his wife, Rita Thapa — the person who seems to have rescued him every time financial quandary or family care became a challenge. Yet, we do not see her as a full person. Perhaps because of the personal tragedies in his life, the children are also barely mentioned.&nbsp; The book is therefore less personal and more technical. Throughout, we learn about Thapa’s thinking as he navigated the world of diplomacy to win him the trust of those who mattered. There are tips here for a new generation of Nepali officials and diplomats about how much commitment and focus is needed to be good at one’s job and serve the national interest. This book adds to tomes that have been written on Nepal’s fragile relationship with India. ‘India has always wished for Nepal to remain dependent on it,’ writes Thapa, who served as Nepal’s ambassador to India and later in the Eminent Persons Group &nbsp;on Indo-Nepal relations that has been allowed to languish. The book has several insights into the Indo-Nepal trysts with diplomacy and agency.&nbsp; China’s role is also recorded, viewed through conversations during a visit to Beijing, but all that was before Nepal’s neighbour to the north emerged as a world economic and military power. The book also has such sudden instances of quirkiness and humour. For instance, we see a young Thapa in America explaining to a government official why he would like to return to Nepal instead of settling down in the US. “Because, Nepal is beautiful,” he said. The text is immaculate and does not read much like a translation, credit for which clearly goes to the team that put the edition together: translator Prawin Adhikari, &nbsp;Anagha Neelakanthan and Bhekh Thapa’s daughter, Manjushree. As Nepal enters a new era of governance and diplomacy, A Life in Public Service: Nepal from Autocracy to Democracy should be essential reading for students of political science, economics and foreign affairs who can gain a fresh perspective on the country’s trajectory.&nbsp; There are dozens of forgotten state secrets recorded in the book, but the reader must also remember this is a story told from one person’s perspective and there may be others.&nbsp; So, what really made Thapa the diplomat he was? I met him in 2004 at the Kantipur TV studio when he was serving as king Gyanendra’s foreign minister. He was there for a studio interview, and I was just done with my English newscast.&nbsp; He surprised me at the door: “Pratibha! I’ve been reading your articles in The Kathmandu Post. You must keep writing.” I thanked him, glad to have been noticed for my work by a stranger. That was perhaps one of the things that set Thapa apart — he excelled at staying close to those in power, while also noticing those who were not.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20260412040412_213e706136a038ec9f5e2b8c6d7f7c1e9ceed9479e22fe2884872ad7bd20955f.jpg" data-media-id="editor_1" data-image-id="20260412040412_213e706136a038ec9f5e2b8c6d7f7c1e9ceed9479e22fe2884872ad7bd20955f" data-rendition-name="original" width="1136" height="702" loading="lazy" alt="Book details"> </figure>

How to win friends and influence nations

This is the 91st episode of Diaspora Diaries, a Nepali Times series in collaboration with Migration Lab providing a platform to share experiences of living, working and studying abroad. I have still not come to terms with the reality that my daughter Ruby Thakur is now the Deputy Speaker of Nepal’s Parliament. Sometimes, when I am walking, the thought hits me, and I cannot believe it.&nbsp; Things changed for my daughter in a very short time. I had dreamt that the best my daughter could achieve was a good engineering job. Fate had bigger plans for her. She is no longer just my daughter, she is the nation’s daughter. Nepal’s daughter.&nbsp; My children’s education was always my foremost priority. That is the main reason I went overseas for employment. I realised the value of education while working in Saudi Arabia. In my office, colleagues with good education earn $8,000 per month working on computers. Those with low education toil outdoors in the heat for much lower wages. A good education or skills can change everything. I am in Nepal on vacation and will soon return to my job. Ruby is all set now. But I still have to take care of my other children's education. As the eldest son, I myself never got a chance to prioritise my own education. I dropped out in Grade 7 because I had to take care of my ageing parents and younger siblings. I have done all kinds of jobs. I worked in a landlord’s field for a share of the harvest. Even now my wife and I farm for the land owner and have to give away half of what we grow.  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20260413120444_051b61e01a5189af538aa1e011acd3e2b38d5f42825116b2afd325d93d0c519b.jpg" data-media-id="editor_0" data-image-id="20260413120444_051b61e01a5189af538aa1e011acd3e2b38d5f42825116b2afd325d93d0c519b" data-rendition-name="original" width="4032" height="2268" loading="lazy" alt="DD"> <figcaption>Sogarath Thakur during a break in Nepal with wife tending to his farm.</figcaption> </figure>   <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20260413120448_8a1c3ac3fd559026bc6f981cc8dc82cb8ad09a3a4f55fb9f6f7fd5f49c3d5571.jpg" data-media-id="editor_1" data-image-id="20260413120448_8a1c3ac3fd559026bc6f981cc8dc82cb8ad09a3a4f55fb9f6f7fd5f49c3d5571" data-rendition-name="original" width="4032" height="2268" loading="lazy" alt="DD"> </figure>  Then I worked as a barber, my family’s line of occupation. I went door to door cutting people’s hair and later worked in a relative’s saloon. Hairstyles were simple back then, and I got to keep half the fee. I also worked in a brick factory where I was paid weekly. &nbsp; I married when I was 16, and my wife was a year younger. As my family and responsibilities grew, I had to migrate leaving behind my three children including Ruby who was just three months old.&nbsp; I went to Qatar where I continued working as a barber. It was a large saloon and the standards for cleanliness and professionalism were higher. I had to hand over 70% of my daily earnings to the employer. I had to rely on my colleague to translate what the customer wanted. But I slowly became fluent in Arabic. I used to jot down words in Nepali and Arabic and memorise them. In Qatar, customers even came at night for haircuts, and people stayed up late. I would work till 3AM.&nbsp; Communicating with my family was one-way. I would go to Bismillah and ask someone to type out questions to my family about their whereabouts, how the harvest was that season. I would offer very little information about my life in Qatar because it was not easy. What was the point of getting them all worried? What could they do? I never received a letter in return, so throughout my time in Qatar, I never knew how my family was faring. When I appeared in the village after five years without any advance notice, it was a bittersweet reunion, and I had no gifts. I still remember how unfamiliar my village felt when I came home after so many years. I had to ask for directions. When I came home, Ruby was already in school. I had left her in my wife’s arms five years prior. I missed her growing up, and did not even see her pictures. My wife had to introduce her to me as her father. But it took just 15 minutes for her to warm up to me.&nbsp; The Arabic skills I had picked up in Qatar came in handy when I remigrated two years later to Saudi Arabia. I worked as a labourer in the desert heat, but once my company found out I spoke Arabic, I was hired for an indoor job as an office boy. The struggle in Qatar had paid off. I worked in an air conditioned office serving tea or coffee, doing bank runs or getting documents signed and photocopied. I have worked in the same company for the past 20 years, sending money home.&nbsp;  <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20260413120448_f083fa873a6d77b19c8b0bdde623415c643a151fb550c57ff4e52b3c2431355f.jpg" data-media-id="editor_2" data-image-id="20260413120448_f083fa873a6d77b19c8b0bdde623415c643a151fb550c57ff4e52b3c2431355f" data-rendition-name="original" width="5712" height="3213" loading="lazy" alt="DD"> </figure>   <figure> <img src="https://publisher-publish.s3.eu-central-1.amazonaws.com/pb-nepalitimes/swp/asv65r/media/20260413120452_5ccd9a01ee05ce26b71381725108215d0f0d3806508b0cb482aabcfea09bbaef.jpg" data-media-id="editor_3" data-image-id="20260413120452_5ccd9a01ee05ce26b71381725108215d0f0d3806508b0cb482aabcfea09bbaef" data-rendition-name="original" width="4032" height="3024" loading="lazy" alt="DD"> </figure>  My wife is not just my children’s guardian, but also mine throughout the two decades I was away. I trust her with all my earnings, and she manages our household finances well. She makes sure that the children’s school fees and other expenses are paid on time. These days, with video calls, things have become much easier for me to stay in touch with home.&nbsp; When Ruby told me she wanted to do an engineering diploma, I was happy. Later, her friends inspired her to join politics so she started getting involved with Shram Sanskriti Party. I first found out she got the proportional representation nomination through social media while on my work duty in Saudi Arabia. I was so excited, but even more so when she was elected Deputy Speaker. I was back home in Dhanusha on my vacation at the time.&nbsp; We are overjoyed and waiting for her to come back to the village for a visit when she gets a chance so we can celebrate properly with everyone. I plan to go back to Saudi Arabia as originally planned, I have a good job and will work for maybe five more years. Ruby has taken 75% of the load off my back. She can help take care of her siblings.&nbsp; I sleep at 8PM every day and wake up at 5AM to exercise before my day in Saudi Arabia begins – I have stuck to the same routine for the last two decades and it has worked well for me and my health. I have a good rapport with my boss who is an Egyptian. My requests to resign have often been met with counter-offers to stay on. My honesty and hard work have won me the company's trust. I will go back and resume working as I have, despite my daughter’s huge achievements. I am still a farmer’s son, a simple man who has to fulfil his family responsibilities. My colleagues in Saudi Arabia are aware that Ruby is Deputy Speaker in Nepal’s Parliament, they are all happy for me and have congratulated me. This time, when I go back, I have promised them that I will throw a bakhri party to celebrate my daughter’s achievement.

The nation’s daughter

Nepalis are insured but not covered

This week, discourse in Nepal’s public sphere has been dominated by numbers and net worth of ministers in the new government following their asset-disclosures.
The inventories revealed the considerable wealth of a majority of the new ministers. This unleashed a deluge of comments and opinion — mostly on social media.
Many considered that Nepal just replaced the old rich with a new rich and that nothing has changed.&nbsp;
Others see it as anti-RSP hysteria. Wealth accumulated when the leaders were private citizens should not be the business of the public, that their financial security will make them less inclined to corruption.
The argument is: plutocrats are less likely to be kleptocrats.
For most Nepalis who voted for the RSP, this has been a new reality check. Most had taken to the streets in September in large part due to outrage over the wealth gap between ordinary Nepalis and those who benefitted from and flaunted wealth and privilege gained through corruption, nepotism, and political connections.&nbsp;
Nepalis saw the nation’s new elected officials as a reflection of themselves — identifying with their youth, their social and professional backgrounds, their disillusionment with the entrenched power structure, their shared struggle. Nepal’s leaders finally seemed approachable and accessible.&nbsp;
The fact that most Cabinet members are well-off, in particular the fact that many of them have generational wealth— even though it might be honestly earned— has made them significantly less relatable to most Nepalis now.
This has also served as another reminder that the political hierarchy is still largely dominated by the privileged class.
Home Minister Sudan Gurung's defensive statement on social media which read, in part, ‘It is not your fault if you are born poor, but it is your fault if you die poor’ (a quote by Bill Gates) did not help.&nbsp;
Gurung later deleted this statement. It drew criticism because it framed poverty as a lack of initiative. This was reductive and unfair to the millions of Nepalis who work their entire lives, often venturing far from home in search for better opportunities. Many faced with unemployment and lack of capital, savings do not have the cushion of inherited wealth to fall back on.&nbsp;
This also serves is a reminder that Nepal does not just need competent leadership, it also needs empathetic leaders.
In any case, perhaps, the depth of scrutiny into how the ministers earned their wealth outside of politics might be unwarranted at this early point in many of their careers.&nbsp;
But on the issue of politico-administrative patronage, cronyism, and nepotism on which the RSP built its institutional and electoral platform, the leadership must be answerable to the public.&nbsp;
CONFLICT OF INTEREST
Last week, Prime Minister Balendra Shah relieved Labour Minister Dipak Sah of his portfolio after the RSP found him to have misused his position to ensure his wife’s appointment to the Health Insurance Board, an action for which Health Minister Nisha Mehta was also given an official warning.&nbsp;
But do the same rules apply to other leaders? The newly-appointed Attorney General Narayan Kandel was previously legal counsel to Rabi Lamichhane, and will now have to prosecute Laichhane’s pending cases, representing a clear conflict of interest.&nbsp;
Lamichhane himself has become a member of the State Affairs and Good Governance Committee, which oversees the very law enforcement agencies that are tasked with looking into his cases.&nbsp;
An analysis on Ukaalo this week also exposed how newly-elected RSP lawmakers, many of them influential business owners with direct stakes in the business, finance, tourism, and infrastructure sectors— now sit in Parliamentary Committees that would directly benefit their interests.&nbsp;
Meanwhile, after criticism of its directive that official notices be published or broadcast only on state-run media— police this week arrested a content creator for posting a derogatory video of political leaders including the Prime Minister. &nbsp;
This is the same rule-by-fear tactic thin-skinned leaders of the past have employed to restrict freedom of expression. A Prime Minister who previously publicly criticised the arrest of another rapper over his lyrics as ‘the police having nothing better to do’, who in his own music did not mince his words or shy away from epithets, and who was generous with expletives to lambast legacy parties and neighbouring nations on social media, cannot now countenance similar rhetoric by ordinary citizens.&nbsp;
The Prime Minister is yet to address Parliament let alone the nation. His reputation as a doer-not-a-talker, leader of mystery will only pacify the public for so long.&nbsp;
All this to prove that digital platforms are double-edged swords: the same network that propelled some to power also has the power to speak truth to it.&nbsp;

political-party

Pre-poll calculations

One body two heads

How to win friends and influence nations

The nation’s daughter

Nepalis are insured but not covered

Gold standard