INDIAN GUNMAN ARRESTED FOR PRISON SHOOTING INCIDENT

MORE DETAILS OF ANSARI KILLING

Kathmandu, 10 March: Indian criminal gang operative Jashbir Singh ‘Bijaya’ was arrested Thursday after he entered central jail at Sundhara in the cpital and shot and injured Younis Ansar on the right shoulder.
Ansari is out of danger Norvic Hospital, where he’s undergoing treatment, said.
Relatives of Ansari shouted anti-police slogans at the hospital for alleged police involvement in the shooting.
Police said search has been launched has been launched for two other suspects while announcing a price money for their arrests..
It wasn’t’ known on whose behalf Singh, who hails from Lucknow, India, acted.
Singh entered prison at 10 in the morning even amid strong security checks and shot Ansari at the visitor’s room at 11.30 or 90 minutes later.
There was metal detectors at the prison.
“This is not a lapse but negligence, “ a police officer claimed.
Two separate police investigation police teams have been instituted to investitage th incident,
Ansari’s father was a minister in the royal regime and has been imprisoned for perceived involvement in fake Indian currency note dealings.
SImngh attempted to kill Ansari more than one year ago in the capital.
Instead he’s suspected of shooting dead Chairman of Channel Nepal Jamin Shah in Lazimpat next to the Indian and Japanese embassies and escaped with Nepali police collusion.
There are suspicions Indian authorities hired criminal elements to kill Shah.
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FOUR TRADE UNIONS AGREE TO NEGOTIATE WITHMANAGEMENT

Kathmandu, 10 March: Four trade unions agreed to sit down with management Thursday to discuss demands for increased salary and perks to conclude an agreement by 14 March.
But Maoist union said they’ll continue their strike that began at the Hetauda Industrial Estate where 44 industries are based this week.
Management of industries, including multi-national companies, handed over keys of industries to Makwanpur district Thursday saying they camn;t meet union demands and asked for security.
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NA WITHHOLDS PROMPOTION OF BRIG. GEN. BAJCHARYA

Kathmandu, 10 March: A military court Thursday withheld the promotion of Brig. Gen. Kiran Bajracharya for two years for acting against army code of conduct.
He was charged for lobbying with politicians, including ministers of the previous government, against colleagues.



The army court withheld promotions of Lt. Col. Pramendra Kishor Chhetri, Maj. Govinda Mainali, Kiran Shrestha and Pankaj Thapa for 18 months.
Maj. Dhruba Pandit’s promotion has been withheld for one year.
Promitions of captains Bidur Chandra Shrestha, Rajesh Kumar Dev and Ram Sagar Yadav hav been halted for six months, the army said..

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OPINION

MEDIUM, MESSAGE AND MAHARA

Kathmandu, 10 March: Krishna Bahadur Mahara’s elevation to senior deputy premier after much haggling within his UCPN (Maoist) and outside raises interesting questions. Let’s begin with the most general one, Maila Baje writes in Nepali Netbook.
Why has Mahara returned to the information and communication ministry after what was arguably a huge promotion? No offense to the men and women in that realm, but the No.2 person in the cabinet leading the contingent of the No. 1 party in the legislature would have been expected to get something far more potent symbolically and in substance.
With the CPN-UML’s Bharat Mohan Adhikari already having bagged his virtual preserve –finance – at the outset, the foreign ministry could have gone to Mahara. He is, after all, the chief of his party’s international department. But, then, that’s probably what Prime Minister Jhal Nath Khanal is dangling before the Madhesi Janadhikar Forum’s Upendra Yadav. (Or is it Sujata Koirala her Nepali Congress?)
Defense might have sounded more dignified for Mahara. But, like the home portfolio, it was too sensitive for the Maoists. Even minister without portfolio would have been more DPM-like, in this case.
Not that Mahara is unqualified for the job. During the height of the insurgency, he was the public face of the Maoists. He led the rebel delegation in the first round of talks with the government. When that fell through, he emerged from hiding to appear on CNN, discharging himself well before an inquisitive international audience.
During his last stint in the ministry… well, top officials there welcomed him back last week saying they had fond memories of his working style. And that says something even after discounting the sweet talk built into the bureaucracy.
During last year’s cash-for-votes telephone scam, Mahara acquitted himself quite well. First he directed his purported Chinese interlocutor to his boss on such a lucrative offer. In the follow-up conversation, Mahara quizzed the caller on whether he had already opened other channels to the party. Once satisfied that he wasn’t being bypassed, he quickly regained his customary cool. And when the conversation was made public, threatening to tarnish Mahara’s personal reputation, he wiggled out with skill.
Far from issuing a flat denial, Mahara conceded that the voice heard on the recording might have been his. He went on to accuse his detractors of creating a montage of disparate innocuous conversations only the sum of which would suggest a scandal. The perfect technology defense.
As a leading lieutenant of party chief Pushpa Kamal Dahal, Mahara seems to have won enough support from the Mohan Baidya and Baburam Bhattarai factions in returning to the cabinet. (He didn’t seem to be on the original list the top comrades had been skirmishing over.) And this brings Maila Baje back to the information and communication conundrum.
Or maybe it’s not really one. With so much at stake for everybody, the former rebels seem to have settled on controlling the medium and the message. Prime Minister Khanal has exhibited an incredible ability to define reality distinct from what those around him see and feel. Now that’s dangerous for a party that once considered it had Khanal on its side and went ahead and sacked the army chief. Little did it anticipate that mysterious phone call (to quote the Chinese) that forced the CPN-UML chief to cut short his visit up north and return home to criticize the move.
So the Maoists now expect Mahara to define whatever comes out of cabinet meetings to dominate the national conversation. Khanal can complain but even he knows how his No.2 would cushion him from an increasingly resentful UML.
In its disarray, the Nepali Congress might take comfort in the thought that Mahara represents that rare Maoist today who had actually begun as a student activist adhering to B.P. Koirala Thought. And within the Maoist fold, Baidya and Bhattarai are probably counting on Mahara’s ebullience to trip Dahal some way somewhere down the line.
Maybe all that public squabbling over the home ministry was actually aimed at getting Mahara in high and close enough to rein in the premier. He may yet get the home ministry. But from next time, our parties might even start fighting over who gets to hold the information and communication portfolio.
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WHAT HOPE WITH SUCH PRACTICES?


Kathmandu, 10 March: In Nepali politics, individuals without any distinguished record for foresight can climb to power but those with talents suffer setback if they have no godfather or godmother. Those who manage to monopolize the top jobs in political parties bend rules to suit their individual and factional interests. Rarely do we find any sibling or close relative of political leaders leading economic hardship, Trikal Vastavik writes in People’s Review..

Leaders who held important state jobs frequently or who enjoyed close proximity to powerful leaders have made mounds of money, possess prime real estate and live lifestyles not commensurate with their known sources of income. Hence we are among the most corrupt in the list that Transparency International issues every year.

Quite a few leaders obtain "scholarships" for their personal nominees, ensure the passage of rich-paying contracts to their favorites and have close ones promoted or deputed to "lucrative" postings. Nothing moves unless influence is peddled, arms twisted or commissions paid. Corruption is a long tradition here but the past 20 years have been the worse, and the last five have crossed all records.

In a country announcing the end of royal dynasty, republican leaders are seen working overtime to promote their own dynastic hold on political organizations, government offices and other sectors. The country's first President Ram, Baran Yadav was embroiled in a controversy within the Nepali Congress that he tried to promote his son's politics at home town in Janakpur.

Madhav Nepal had his daughter, an average student of science, obtain a plum Indian scholarship for medicine. He posted his sibling to a plum post in Hong Kong even if the latter did not have any due credential to hold the post. His party mates like Bam Dev Gautam reportedly recommended not only his son but also others close to his political network for foreign scholarships.

Actually, the list is long, topped by the recommendations from the late Girija Prasad Koirala whose authoritarian style of functioning ruined not only his party that successfully led the country's three major political movements but broke most rules in the book concerning public institutions and legal procedures. Like the Midas touch, GPK showered favors on hangars on and coterie who, as a result, went on to mint money, live luxury and exercise extensive influence. One has only to look at the lifestyles of these sycophants to have an idea of the quick money they made.

GPK's daughter Sujata epitomizes many things unflattering. The German man who she had married does not live the luxurious lifestyle she does here in this poverty-ridden country. Sujata does not have any known source of income to support the lifestyle she has lived these past 20 years, i.e. after the 1990 restoration of multiparty democracy when her father's political stars also saw a spurt in terms of fortunes and influence.

Sujata's only claim to power and influence was and is that she is GPK's daughter. Yet she managed to head the NC team to the Madhav Kumar-led cabinet as the deputy premier looking after the foreign ministry portfolio. All other senior or youth or elected leaders in the NC were bypassed but perhaps rightly so considering that the latter did not raise any voice against such nepotism fostering dynastic tendency in a newly announced republic.

And the malaise is growing. Sujata's son-in-law Rubel Chaudhary, according to many leading media reports, was involved in illegal activities. Sujata defended her son-in-law saying that charges were being made without any evidence. It was clear that Rubel, a Bangladeshi national, would never be found guilty. In fact, the police trooped to Sujata's residence for questioning the new royal, Rubel, regarding the Tiger Tops incident in Chitwan involving also former Crown Prince Paras.

Public perception is that Rubel will not be found guilty just as evidence of corruption was not found against hundreds of others, including political leaders, in the last two decades. People do not believe that action will be taken at all against anyone with a powerful person to protect and promote him or her.

There are millions of people who believe in the existence of the Almighty Lord Narayan but no Nepali who believes that cases will be pursued with promptness against Rubel. Again, either Citizen Paras was guilty of firing on air or action should be taken against Rubel for making the false statement he made against a Nepali citizen.

As for public perception, the surge of support for Citizen Paras saw such that Madhav Kumar Nepal, the then Prime Minister, ordered his home minister not to allow the former crown prince to visit Nawalparasi where thousands people had organized a special program with him as the chief guest. MKN, last autumn, had also prevented former King Gyanendra from visiting a Kumari Temple at Hanumandhoka, concluding that the former monarch was "politicizing" his visits to temple.

Now, MKN, whose party president Jhala Nath Khanal had declared his government as a failed government, was not known to be a man of decision but schemer. Having lost elections three years ago from two constituencies, both considered "traditionally safe seats", he stepped down as CPN (UML) general secretary. But he could not resist the temptation of entering parliament through a circuitous route of asking one of his loyal party members to resign. The loyal supporter stepped down and MKN filled the vacant post from UML's quota under the proportional procedure.

MKN could claim to have made history by becoming the country's premier. Well, so did a score of others since the 19th century. Former pancha Surya Bahadur Thapa and GPK share the top spot for holding the top job five times. Thapa held the mantle thrice during the partyless years and twice in the post-1990 decades. Sher Bahadur Deuba became a government head thrice and his one-time mentor Krishna Prasad Bhattarai twice. However, MKN's will go down in history as a cabinet that could and did nothing for a year and a half.

Meanwhile, Transparency International might consider corruption in Nepal as among the highest but this is a country where there is hardly any corruption case actually coming to a logical conclusion. The rot was deep and dark; it continues to be deeper and darker; and, most dishearteningly, it does not show any sign of easing anytime soon.
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