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To celebrate the launch of Qatar Airways’ inaugural flight to Thessaloniki, the second largest city in Greece, Qatar Airways Nepal hosted a media interaction with the Honorary Consul of Greece Bikram Pandey and Country Manager Jayaprakash Nair.

At the briefing, Nair highlighted the award-winning airline’s robust expansion plans, as well as its commitment to bringing more travelers from Nepal to Greece, and to connect Thessaloniki to its extensive global network via the Hamad International Airport (HIA) in Doha. “We are tremendously excited to launch our four weekly flight service to Thessaloniki. Having three daily flights to Athens, we realized the growing demand in Greece, and what better place than the Thessaloniki?” he said. “This new four weekly flight service will without doubt offer our Greece passengers more convenience and alternate choice in addition to Athens”.

Speaking at the event, Pandey said, “We appreciate Qatar Airways’ strong support for Greece. An airline of this stature will further boost Thessaloniki’s reputation as a leading tourist destination.”

Since the breakout of the support level at 1,350, Mr Bull went into recess while Mr Bear took the cen­ter-stage. Talk of the town moved from “long correc­tion” to “bearish”. The panic sell that started on February 28 chugged along on its southbound track. There were small respites on March 6-7 and March 13-15 periods. The bearish sentiments of the market were further veri­fied when the gains made in these short-lived bounce­backs were completely wiped out within a single day’s trading on March 11 (wiping out the gains made on March 6-7) and March 18 (wiping out the gains made on bounceback rally of March 13-15).

The southbound move­ment reignited on March 18 continued without any pull-ups for more than a week. Interestingly, the volume traded started to increase after the dip on March 19 (Rs 256 million), reaching Rs 493 million on March 28.

This indicated increase in buying interest in the sell­er-dominated market. Peo­ple start see each and every scrip as cheap and heavily discounted. The market consists of the traders and the investors. For the trad­ers, the current market is giving lesser opportunities for quick gains. But, the investors, who have the patience to stay the course for one to two years, are having a field day choosing fundamentally strong and undervalued scrip. If we do proper financial analysis, we can now find many scrips with considerably good EPS (earning per share) with lesser PE ratio (price-earn­ings ratio) which are simply begging to be accumulated. Mr. Bear might continue to have the center stage, mak­ing the majority fearful. But the smarter few will start being greedy and start accu­mulating for the long haul.  

By MANIL SHRESTHA

Have you ever been heartbro­ken, as a woman, watching some Nepali TV ads? Some new commercials seem to be igno­rant of what women have achieved globally and instead continue to portray women as weak, inferior, and even stupid.Ad one: Two prominent cricketers Gyanendra Malla and Basanta Regmi enter a living room sporting cricket jerseys, arguing about their bowling whereas the female actor playing Gyanendra Malla’s wife is seen with a bowl and a tray of vegetables, in full make-up, watching a Hindi serial (being emotional too), who leaves the room (after drawing Gyanendra’s stare) so that the guys can watch TV.

Ad two: A helpless woman hangs on to the feet (literally) of her hus­band/boyfriend/lover who is holding on to iron rods convincing her that they will be safe as “the man” has the support of those life-saving (as if) rods. This commercial shows that women are such stupid creatures that they risk their lives holding on to the feet of their partners even in life-and-death situations. Even animals could know the dangers of these risks!

It is true that Nepal was a male-dominant country for long and ads like these could have been con­sidered normal. But hey, times have changed! For example, the head of the Nepali state is a woman (serv­ing her second term, in fact), there was a woman Chief Justice of the Supreme Court as well as Speaker of the House. Female literacy rate has gone up significantly (around 80 percent of women aged between 15-24), more and more women are holding senior positions in workplaces. So this kind of ignorance is no longer justifiable.

It is also true that there’s still a significant percent of Nepali wom­en who need men for emotional and financial support. Culturally, too, we can’t see the recent changes happening all over the country. In fact, we still hear cases of women beaten to death with allegations of witchcraft. We still hear about brutal stories of girls (even children) being gang-raped. This is exactly where the media (not just journalists but also ad agencies) can play a crucial role in conveying the message that women can live lives of dignity.

But, on the other hand, we can also learn from Indian TV commer­cials highlighting women’s roles in a creative manner. The ad of Indian cricketers with their mother's names printed on their jerseys breaks one stereotype. #Sharetheload is an example of a campaign started by Ariel detergent where a father acknowledges his problem in par­enting and encourages men to be role models and share the work load.

Television ads still have the power to influence people’s minds. And it is the responsibility of people from all walks of lives to acknowledge that there’s a growing population of women—educated, competent and self-reliant—who want the typical gender roles to end for good. It is now time to rise above the inequality paradigm.

BY PRERANA MARASINI

[email protected]

Janakpurdham: Chief Minis­ter of Province 2 Lalbabu Raut on March 27 unveiled his gov­ernment’s 100-day action plan which aims to lead the prov­ince to prosperity. An invest­ment-friendly climate, inves­tor-friendly laws and policies, a province-level investment board, and development of spe­cial economic zones are some of the priorities of the action plan. Likewise, the document states that the province will be developed into a green zone through the promotion of organic farming and fishery. Among other priorities spelled out are cold storage facilities for agriculture products, mod­ernization of agriculture and guaranteed irrigation. RSS

DARCHULA: A 15-member team of the Armed Police Force has been dispatched from the APF border security battalion in Darchula to secure the north­ern border with China, after it was reported that the Indi­an side had unilaterally con­structed four bridges over the Mahakali river. The APF team aims to secure the area in the wake of the construction of the new bridges, head of the battal­ion Ambika Prasad Joshi said. The team led by sub-inspector Rajendra Chand will take stock of the situation and also check any illegal activities including smuggling, Joshi added. RSS

KATHMANDU: Nepal lost its final match in the AFC Asian cup 2019 qualifying stage, going down to Yemen 2-1. In the match held on March 26 at the Suheim Bin Hamad Stadium in Doha, Qatar, Nepal lost after conceding a penalty in the 84th minute. Until then the score was tied at 1-1. Nepal finished fourth in the group that also involved Yemen, Philippines and Tajikistan. Group leaders Philippines and Yemen qual­ified for the 2019 Asian Cup. RSS

Last month, the High Level For­eign Policy Review Task Force submitted its recommendations to the then Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba. The government has not yet made the report pub­lic; however, it has elicited enough curiosity and debate on how Nepal’s foreign policy should be driven and what its priorities should be as the country adopts a federal structure. Nepal’s location is a strategic asset rather than a liability. The ‘Strategic Vision’ must reformulate Nepal’s geostrategic and geo-economic pri­orities. This can only come from a coherent ‘National Security Strat­egy’. But Nepal has not only failed to formulate it, it has also not reori­ented itself to a changing global power structure.Neighborhood First

Nepal should adopt ‘Neighbor­hood First’ as a foreign-policy prior­ity. Media reports suggest the Task Force recommended the same. While the rhetoric of ‘special rela­tions with India’, popularly used by democratic parties, has drawn criti­cism for favoring one neighbor, the ‘Policy of Equidistance’ advocated by the left parties is not compatible with Nepal’s geopolitical realities either. In such a situation, the pol­icy of ‘neighborhood first’ can be apt, whereby Nepal can embrace a ‘balanced’ foreign policy to serve its national interest.

Nepal enjoys excellent historical, political and socio-cultural bonds with India. At the same time, Chi­na’s economic might presents an opportunity for Nepal to pursue rapid economic development. How­ever, the two neighbors—India and China—are hostile to each other and their prime concern—security—over­laps in Nepal. In such a situation, it is a herculean task for the tiny Himalayan nation to balance them. The best Nepal can do is address their genuine security concerns, assuring them that Nepal would not be used against them and asking them to refrain from interfering in Nepal’s internal affairs. Nepal should reaffirm that a stable Nepal is also in their interest, as only a stable neighbor can properly address their concerns.

This is where a powerful National Security Advisor becomes impera­tive. The government should imme­diately set up a strong National Security Advisory Board led by the National Security Advisor that over­sees strategic issues and advises the prime minister on all matters relat­ing to internal and external threats.

Nepal’s second foreign-policy priority should be its “extended neighbors”, the countries with which it has strong economic ties and those where a large number of Nepali migrants work, such as the South East Asian and Gulf countries. ‘Extended neighbors’ can include SAARC countries other than India. Similarly, “Great Powers” and other friendly countries could be Nepal’s third foreign-policy priority.

Challenges

Two major challenges are the diffi­culty in formulating and implement­ing a coherent foreign policy in a fragmented and unstable political setting characterized by a poverty of strategic thinking, and dealing with a fluid and rapidly evolving regional context with shrinking space for an autonomous approach.

Similarly, foreign aid management would be another challenge. The new federal structure will also add to the complexities as the aid to the local level will have to be channeled through Kathmandu. To speed up the country’s economic growth, the government should give special con­cessions to sectors like hydropower and infrastructure.

The Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) is going to be an important pillar of Chinese foreign policy for the next decade. It is yet to be seen how Nepal deals with the BRI with­out displeasing the southern neigh­bor. Nepal should assure India that Nepal’s engagement with China is purely for its economic interest and that it is not party to China’s plan of ‘encircling India’, unlike what India perceives. Moreover, Nepal can also express interest in the freedom cor­ridor/quadrilateral that India, Japan, the US and Australia have initiated.

Other important areas to deal with are terrorism, climate change, disarmament, traffick­ing of drugs, women and chil­dren. Climate change is a pressing issue and countries like Nepal are particularly vulnerable. Apart from these, Nepal has made remarkable contribution to the UN Peacekeep­ing operations, which has improved Nepal’s international image. Simi­larly, a Hindu pilgrimage circuit, a Buddhist circuit and Gorkha Regi­ments can be effective soft power tools. Surprisingly, Nepal has failed to make good use of its soft power.

Way ahead

There is a dire need to reorient Nepal’s foreign policy with the changing global power structure, keeping all four aspects—political, economic, security and institu­tion-building—into consideration. The political parties should reach a basic consensus and formulate a coherent foreign policy. Nepal can’t be stable and prosperous without a comprehensive security framework. Nepal also needs to pay urgent attention to institu­tion-building. Each ministry should invest in research and development. The foreign ministry should estab­lish well-funded research institutes. The Institute of Foreign Affairs is in a pathetic state. Honing of diplomatic and negotiation skills is a must for Nepal’s young diplomats. All these are important steps for the democ­ratization of Nepal’s foreign policy.

BY Dr PRAMOD JAISWAL

The author is editor of the new book “Revisiting Nepal’s Foreign Pol­icy in Contemporary Global Power Structure” published from New Delhi

Province 6, which has recently been named Karnali Province, will soon be directly linked by air with Kathmandu. There will be direct flights between Kathmandu and the provincial capital Surkhet from early next month. Nepal Airlines Corporation (NAC), the national flag carrier, and Buddha Air, a private carrier, have agreed to fly between Kathmandu and Surkhet start­ing April 4. The two carriers reached an agreement to this effect with the federal ministry of Culture, Tourism and Civil Aviation last week.

Currently, there is no direct air service from the capital to any district of Karnali Prov­ince. As a result, travelers from that province have to use the airport in Nepalgunj, the cap­ital of Province 5. For about six months in 2013, Buddha Air used to fly between Kath­mandu and Surkhet, but it had to terminate the service after incurring heavy losses. Many passengers preferred to fly into or out of Nepalgunj (instead of Surkhet) as it was cheaper. The airline compa­nies have now agreed to adjust ticket prices.

The resumption of flights between Kathmandu and Surkhet is also expected to bring more tourists to Karnali.  

BY LALIT B. BUDA | SURKHET