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LG rolls out AI washing machines

LG Electronics (LG) is expand­ing the availability of its innovative front-loader washing machines with ThinQ AI powered by the company’s proprietary Direct Drive™ to most markets world­wide by the year’s end. With the benefits of AI DD™ the new wash­ers are able to deliver thorough yet gentle cleaning by determining the weight and fabric character­istics of each load for faster and better laundry results.

LG’s AI DD technology leverages big data on 20,000 pieces of information related to washer usage and applies settings based on the volume and delicateness of the garments in each load of laundry to provide the most optimized washing cycle. This guarantees exceptionally clean laundry every time with the added benefit of an 18 percent reduction in damage to the clothes, prolonging the life of every wardrobe.

Hero launches Xpulse 200

In a strong reaffirmation of its aggres­sive premium product strategy for the Nepali market, Hero MotoCorp— the world’s largest two-wheeler manufacturer—this week launched its highly popular premium motorcycle XPulse 200 in the country.

Introducing a new 200cc adventure biking segment, the distinctly characterized XPulse 200 is now available at Hero MotoCorp dealer­ships across all major cities in the country.

Earlier this month, Hero MotoCorp had launched two new premium motorcycles in the country— the XPulse 200T and Xtreme 200S. Hero MotoCorp forayed into Nepal in 2010 with Nepal General Marketing Pvt. Ltd. (NGM) as its exclusive distributor in the country. The XPulse 200 has been attractively priced at Rs 385,000.

Krishna Bahadur Mahara. Mohammad Aftab Alam. Parvat Gurung. Over the past one month three federal lawmakers have been linked with grave crimes, from mass murder to attempted rape. Other lawmakers also routinely get into fishy stuff. Abuse of office and corruption are even more pervasive. What does all this say about the state of our politics? One obvious answer is that those in positions of power feel they can get away with literally anything in a country steeped in a culture of impunity.

Our lawmakers, after all, represent the society they inhabit. When nearly the whole bureaucracy and political leadership are corrupt, we cannot expect our lawmakers to be saints. Yet how could someone like Alam, with documented evidence of burning people alive against him, walk as a free man for over a decade? Even more egregiously, how was he elected to the federal parliament? An optimist might argue that justice, though late, has been done. Tell that to the families of his victims.

Even so, they are comparably lucky. The families of those who were killed or forcefully disappeared during the decade-long conflict have waited for justice for even longer. The former Maoist guerrillas have always argued that even the most heinous crimes from the conflict period should be treated as part of a political movement rather than as punishable offenses. The army is as averse to seriously investigating war-era crimes. By design, the two transitional justice bodies have been rendered toothless.

The rape and murder of Nirmala Panta is still unresolved, more than a year after the fact. The police then botched the Mahara rape investigation. How do people believe they live in a law-abiding society? There is now a widespread belief that our politicians and MPs have only gotten richer and more powerful after the advent of the federal democratic system; the police, meanwhile, are thoroughly corrupt.

The best way to clean up our parliament and political system is to set strict criteria on candidate selection for provincial and national elections. All those with criminal backgrounds should be strictly barred. But that is not enough. Along with this, there should be a hard cap on campaign financing. Our elections have gotten more and more expensive with time. It is now impossible for someone to contest a seat in the federal parliament without at least Rs 20 million.

It is said that democracy is an imperfect system, except that all other political systems are even more flawed. It is the responsibility of its supposed custodians to ensure they do not destroy it beyond repair.

Attend

Krama

4 pm, Oct 19-23
Commoń Room Gastró Loungé
Soaltee Crown Plaza, Kathmandu

An art exhibition, displaying the rise of contemporary women artists in the 21st century, “Krama” explores the flowers of creativity that have bloomed in an ever expanding art form that grows more and more popular.

Listen

Jazz Bazaar

2:30 pm, Saturday, October 19
Gokarna Forest Resort
Thali, Kathmandu

Escape the city for a marathon of music at the lush Gokarna Forest Resort. The festival lineup, with top musicians from Nepal and across the world, will take turns on stage before joining hands to jam under the stars.

Visit

Nepalinked Tattoo Festival 2019

11 am, Oct 18-20
New Dakshinkali Village Resort
Dakshinkali, Kathmandu

In times of commercialization of tattooing and mushrooming of tattoo conventions, the team of Nepal Inked wanted to create an alternative space for more personal interaction between tattooists and their artworks. So it decided to leave Kathmandu and take the visitors on a journey to Pharping, around 15 km from the capital.

Walk

PINK Walkathon 2019

7 am, Saturday, October 19
National Hospital & Cancer Research Center
Jawalakhel, Lalitpur

Walk to raise awareness on breast cancer. The walkathon starts from National Hospital and Cancer Research Center, Jawalakhel and ends at Patan Durbar Square, Mangalbazar, Lalitpur.

Q. Your personality in three words?
A. Straight-forward, emotional, logical.

Q. A common misconception about you?
A. That I have a humongous attitude.

Q. Your favorite fictional antagonist?
A. Ashutosh Rana’s iconic role in the Bollywood movie ‘Sangharsh’.

Q. An advice to your younger self?
A. Be real, don’t be plastic. The more you explore yourself, the more it will help you in life.

Q. Your spirit animal and why?
A. I can’t relate to any animal because they are too innocent to be compared with humans.

Q. Favorite Nepali movie so far?
A. Balidaan, especially Haribansha Acharya’s role that was a marked contrast to his comical stereotype. By far the best actor in Nepali cinema created a character that brought tears to my eyes.

Q. What is your happiest memory?

A. Every moment in life has been memorable, among which establishing the House of Fashion is the happiest memory that I’d cherish for life.

Q. Which living person do you most admire the most, and why?

A. It’s always been my mother since she’s taught us to become better persons and gives us strength to believe in ourselves.

Q. What would be your fancy dress costume of choice?

A. Going as a fast food item is sure to turn some heads.

Q. What is your guiltiest pleasure?

A. Letting myself daydream. It especially feels like a guilty pleasure if I have a lot of things on my to-do list.

Q. How would you describe yourself in a sentence?

A. An ambitious and driven person.

Q. What has been the greatest challenge for taking House of Fashion forward?

A. Trying and establishing something innovative in country like Nepal, where people have average incomes but high expectations.  

First Nepal-German business forum

The Embassy of the Federal Republic of Germany, Kathmandu, in cooperation with the Nepal-German Chamber of Commerce and Industry (NGCCI) and the Investment Board Nepal, organized the First Nepal Ger­man Business Forum on Oct 2. Held under the theme of ‘Building Bridges: Nepal-Ger­man Business Relations,’ the forum allowed German firms to explore the Nepali market and benefit from new dynamics character­ized by political stability, energy security, and efforts of Nepali government to improve investment climate. Altogether 28 repre­sentatives from 20 German companies and organizations met their Nepali counterparts and exchanged contacts and knowledge.

Coca-Cola celebrates mothers this festive season  

Continuing with the fourth edition of “Mann Kholau Coke Sanga”, a localized form of “Share a Coke”, Coca-Cola has come up with a unique way to celebrate the festivals of Dashain and Tihar with its customers this season. Coca-Cola has launched its new Dashain Campaign with the theme ‘My mom makes my Dashain spe­cial’. This campaign con­veys the message that our mothers work selflessly and tirelessly to make our Dashain and Tihar special, to pour every bit of happi­ness into our festive season, a statement issued by the company said. The spe­cial ingredient of Dashain is always our mother, and her love.

Acknowledging the vital role mothers play in the festive season, Coke has launched labels which encompasses six different endearing forms of the way we call our mother, i.e Aama, Mai, Muwa, Mamu, Mummy, and Ma. These labels are inserted in the place of regular labels.  

The handling of the rape charge against the speaker of the federal house Krishna Bahadur Mahara has been appalling. First, the woman, the supposed rape victim, reportedly called the police emergency number ‘100’ to report the rape on the evening of September 29. She subsequently texted several high-ranking government officials informing them of the same. In addition, she gave a video interview to an online news portal where she details physical abuse she suffered at the hands of Mahara and shows his text messages, including one asking her to ‘forget about yesterday’ (referring to the night of the alleged rape.)

Apparently, fearful of filing a case against someone as powerful as Mahara, the police did not collect vital evidence from the woman’s residence immediately. They did so only a day later, after the Nepal Communist Party had asked Mahara to resign from his post of the speaker and an MP. This smacks of the subservience of the Nepali Police to their current political masters. The police, which is yet to recover from the Nirmala Panta-fiasco, blundered once again, but so did other supposedly responsible state organs.

One online news portal interviewed the concerned woman, blurring her face to hide her identity. But the blurring technique was so clumsy, her full face was clearly visible a number of times. Another online portal published her phone number. The Nepali media, and especially the headline-chasing online media, seems unaware of even basic norms of journalism.

The NCP, to its credit, asked Mahara to step down. But, curiously, a day later, the woman withdrew her accusation against Mahara. If her intent was to defame the speaker, she deserves to be punished. If she recanted because she was threatened, that too is a jail-worthy offense. The public also deserves to know if there was some kind of out-of-court settlement between the two parties. In any case, now that it has been established that Mahara, the holder of one of the country’s highest offices, had actually gone to the woman’s residence that night, drunk, that alone makes him unfit to hold any public office in the future.

People these days have so little faith in the state mechanism that even if the truth were reveled tomorrow, few may believe it. Yet that does not absolve the NCP, which voters have overwhelmingly trusted to run the country, of a moral responsibility of getting to the bottom of the incident and making the findings public. Relieving Mahara of his twin responsibilities is only a partial, temporary solution. More important is for people to believe that justice has been done, whoever may be culpable.

(UPDATED INTERVIEW)
To prepare for the likely Nepal visit of Chinese President Xi Jinping, many Chinese security teams have visited Kathmandu to take stock of the security measures here. Our security bodies are making their own plans. APEX’s Kamal Dev Bhattarai talked to Retired Deputy Inspector General of Police Hemant Malla, who was himself closely involved in preparing security plans for many visiting foreign dignitaries, on whether the current preparations are enough. And are there specific threats to Xi while he is in Nepal?

How do you evaluate the security preparations for Chinese President Xi Jinping’s planned Nepal visit?

There are two aspects to security preparations. The first involves providing training and guidance to security personnel who will be deployed during the visit, which include how to provide ground security and handle possible unpleasant situations. The second involves identifying and assessing likely security threats. Currently, preparations are focused on these two areas.  

Are these preparations adequate in your view?

When we talk about security preparations, only the preparations of Nepal Police are being highlighted. Some political issues related to China, like the one related to Tibetan refugees, are beyond the jurisdiction of the police. The National Investigation Department (NID) is mandated to handle those issues. In my observation, the NID is not effective enough to handle those issues. The intelligence agency cannot fulfill its responsibility based on its current strength. Their respective strength may vary, but the Nepal Army (NA), the Nepal Police, the Armed Police Force and the NDI should act in a coordinated way to gather and analyze information. This would make the security arrangement more effective. The army is also involved in overall process as it takes the responsibility of providing security in core areas of visit. I feel that all security agencies are not functioning on an equal footing.

What are the possible areas of threat to Chinese President XI during his Nepal visit?

One major concern for China has always been the activities of Tibetan community in Nepal, labelled anti-China activities. The Tibetans could demonstrate during Xi’s visit. Earlier, there were extreme causes of self-immolation by Tibetan refugees in Kathmandu. There are chances of protestors going to the same extreme, thereby raising Chinese concern.

Another less discussed issue is related to the Uighur Muslims. They are connected to the Al-Qaeda and Taliban through the Turkistan Islamic Party (TIP). This TIP in turn is connected to Jaish-e-Mohammed and Indian Mujahideen, both of which are operating on Indian soil. The concern is that several people connected with Jaish-e-Mohammed and Indian Mujahideen have been detained in Nepal as well. They have used Nepal as a shelter to communicate with their people and to infiltrate terrorists inside India. We have detained several of them and handed them over to India. So this could be another security threat.

Are there specialized groups in our security agencies for such high-level visits?

The army has a specialized team dedicated to providing personal security to VIPs. This team provides security to the president and the prime minister. Other agencies also deploy their members. The problem with other security agencies is lack of specialized or devoted group for such highest level visits. Given our growing engagement in internal forums, the number of such high-level visits will further increase in the days to come, which highlights the need for a separate permanent and specialized team. For example, India has the Special Protection Group (SPG) which provides proximate security to its President, Prime Minister and other VIPs. Time has come to prepare a dedicated and specialized manpower within Nepal Police and Armed Police Force.

Has there been no effort to prepare such specialized forces in Nepal?

In Nepal Police, a separate unit was established for such security issues. But what we need is a specialized and permanent unit. Frequent transfers do not help. We have to think long-term.
 

How do you assess the recent visits of Chinese security officials?

It is a normal practice for security teams from respective countries to visit host countries prior to high-level visits. For example, many security officials from China have come to Nepal ahead of Xi’s planned visit. Some believe that foreign security agencies can work in Nepal without consulting us, which is not true. Home Ministry ensures such coordination. In case of high-level visits, the joint security team discusses the movements of VIP, routes of travel, and other security aspects. A team consisting of the Nepal Army, the Nepal Police, the National Investigation Department and the people of the respective embassy work in a coordinated way.
 

Can the visiting delegation also bring their own weapons for self-protection?

There were unnecessary rumors during the Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Nepal. Ex-officials of security agencies also made unnecessary noises. When our president or prime minister goes abroad, they can take security forces and weapons with them. It is not true that only foreign dignitaries bring weapons. But you need to take prior approval. There is a tradition of declaring the types and amount of weapons at custom points. When the visit is over, all weapons should be taken back informing the same custom points.  

Regarding this visit, the rule of engagement is not clear. For example, if something happens during the VIP visit, who will be the first responder? Their team or our security agency? The two governments should be clear over the security. Due to unclear rules of engagement, there have been problems abroad, but luckily, not here. But clarity is always desirable. If something happens to the VIP, who is responsible? What will we do? We have to resolve these issues.
 

Highest-level foreign dignitaries like Narendra Modi also bring their own transport vehicles. Why?

I had been deployed at the airport during the visit of Hilary Clinton. They too had come with all the vehicles necessary for motorcade. For the security of the VIP, they modify the vehicles. The VIP vehicles are modified based on individual threat perception. The exact type of a vehicle a visiting VIP personal needs may not be available in Nepal. But, again, this is a normal practice.
 

When it comes to VIP security, the intelligence agencies always have an important role. How do you assess the capability of our intelligence agency?

There is no government support for our intelligence agency. Right intelligence is crucial in this day and age. And information is the currency of that intelligence. Yet there has been little government investment in this sector. There is a mindset that information comes without investment, and that information is easy to collect. That is no longer the case.
 

Do you think the Chinese President has more reasons to be wary about visiting Nepal than a leader of some other country?

I do not think so. Since the Panchayat days, we have had countless high-level visits from China, including of their president and prime minister. And we have never had any problem. In my opinion, the Chinese are concerned about the Tibetan issue. Besides the old problem of possible protests by the Tibetan community, now there is also the issue of finding the right successor to the Dalai Lama. This could also contribute to protests here.

Are there any chances of pro­tests in Kathmandu in support of the anti-government protests in Hong Kong?

I see such a chance. In my anal­ysis, there are possibilities of pro­tests from two quarters. First, some supporters of the Hong Kong pro­tests could launch a small symbolic protest here. Second, some tourists from Hong Kong who are visiting Nepal could also protest. Security forces should keep a close eye on this aspect of security.