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In collaboration with the Good Shepherd International Foundation, Italy, and with the help of a grant from BEGECA and MISEREOR, Germany, Opportunity Village Nepal (OVN) has handed over health equipment/materials to the Department of Health Services.

The health equipment/materials were handed over by Sanu Amatya, President of Opportunity Village Nepal, Bhagwati Sangraula, Acting Director of Social Welfare Council and Sister Taskila Nicholas, Country Director of Good Shepherd International Foundation Nepal to Upendra Dhungana, Head of Management Division, Department of Health Services Teku, Kathmandu. The handed over equipment includes 25 oxygen concentrators, 3200 face masks and 80 nasal oxygen concentrators.

The health equipment/materials handed over to the Department of Health Services will be made available to 13 government hospitals in 9 districts, namely, Kanchanpur, Bake, Gulmi, Rupandehi, Dhading, Baglung, Tanahu, Syangja and Kaski.

Sister Taskila Nichols, Country Director of the Good Shepherd International Foundation Nepal, said that the materials received from Germany for the response to Covid-19 should be reached to the concerned government hospitals on time and be used and managed effectively.

Durga Shrestha, the director from Opportunity Village Nepal expressed her sincere gratitude to the Ministry of Health and Population, Department of Health Services, Social Welfare Council and Good Shepherd International Foundation Nepal for their support on campaign of responding to Covid-19 initiated by Opportunity Village Nepal (OVN), Kathmandu.

Sanu Amatya, President of OVN added, “OVN has provided these materials to government hospitals with the objective of supporting the Government of Nepal in Responding to Covid-19.

Members of the Nepali Congress picketed Birgunj Metropolitan City’s office for two hours on Sept 2. The members, led by the party’s city chief Bijay Sarraf, also met the mayor and submitted a memo demanding the proper management of waste.

Sarraf says, “The situation of waste management in the city has worsened in the past few months. The city doesn’t pick up waste daily. That’s why we picketed the office for two hours and submitted a memo to the mayor demanding that he take action right away.”

But Mayor Bijay Sarawagi says he has already made substantial changes to the city’s waste management in his four years in office. He says, “Before I became mayor, city residents could see heaps upon heaps of waste not just inside alleys, but also on the main road. Visitors used to call Birgunj a city under garbage. But things have improved a lot. But we need to do more.”

Two years ago, Birgunj handed over the responsibility for its waste management to Prithvitara-NK International JV, a private company, under a public-private partnership model. Under the deal, the company has to manage waste produced by the city for four years. The company has also been allowed to charge residents a monthly fee for its services.

Mayor Sarawagi says the step has helped manage waste in the city, but lack of support from the residents has slowed progress. According to the city, as more than 30 percent of the city’s residents don’t pay for the service, the city has waived the contractor’s obligation to pay Rs 240 million to the city. Under a revised agreement, the contractor keeps 50 percent of the money paid by households and gives the other 50 percent to the city.

“We tried to manage waste by hiring a private company after similar models worked in Biratnagar and Bharatpur,” says Mayor Sarawagi. “But the residents of our city didn’t cooperate,” he says. The city has distributed bins to each household in its 32 wards to segregate degradable and non-degradable waste.

The city has been urging residents to give their waste to collectors who come on tractors or pull carts. But instead, they throw their waste in the sewage line, complained Sarawagi.

The city even introduced new legislation to discourage haphazard disposal of waste. The new law contains provisions that can be used to impose fines of Rs 500-100,000 on those who dispose of waste haphazardly. But the law hasn’t been implemented effectively, even two years after it entered into force.

A strange logic seems to have taken hold of some investors in Nepal Stock Exchange (NEPSE). So long as the stock indices keep increasing, they are happy to pocket the gains. But, when the market self-corrects and declines, they cry foul. They knock on the finance minister’s doors to intervene. They rally against the central bank, asking it to ditch measures to limit speculative spending in the stock market. This is not how things work in a functional economy.

Nepal Rastra Bank is perfectly justified in capping the amount (Rs 120 million) that a person or institution can get by holding their share certificates as collateral in banks—if they are to reinvest the loan in stocks. Some blame this provision in the latest monetary policy for recent market corrections. But it’s the right step and will help the market emerge from the clutches of a handful of cunning investors who thrive on fanning wild speculations. The argument that the government shouldn’t intervene in an incipient stock market is also flawed: It is an open secret that NEPSE is under the virtual control of a handful of big investors and stockbrokers who have gamed the system.

The allure of stock investing greatly increased during the pandemic as there were few other investment avenues. Many got in, believing it was an easy way to make money. Soon, they were addicted. They forgot it is just as easy to lose money, especially in a rigged system. Thus the central bank must keep NEPSE on a tight leash and continue to limit big speculative investment. These measures will also help make the stock exchange safer and more reliable.

The 2007-2008 global financial crisis was a cruel reminder that when financial bubbles burst, they can have a devastating impact on people’s lives and livelihoods. Meanwhile, such types as the loan sharks, inside traders, and sellers of dubious financial instruments either disappeared or used legal loopholes to go scot-free. Again, it was the governments that had to ultimately come to the rescue of their citizens. Only thoughtful and timely regulations can forestall such a travesty of justice.

Ventura Bottler's Pvt Ltd has announced the launch of a new carbonated soft drink line: RC Cola, Mighty Rain, RC Q Lemon Lime, RC Q Orange, ZeerUP, G- Power, carbonated water, and water.

The drinks are available in select Kathmandu, Lalitpur, and Bhaktapur retail outlets. RC Cola is an original American cola established in 1905. While the required raw concentrate materials are imported from Columbus, Georgia, the drink is bottled by Venture Bottlers in Makwanpur.

POCO, the popular smartphone brand, this week announced the launch of its much-anticipated smartphone POCO F3 GT. Taking the F series to newer heights, POCO F3 GT delivers powerful experiences, elevated gameplay, superior camera capabilities, and top-of-the-line features all packed in its uniquely sophisticated, stylish, and premium ‘Slipstream’ Design, the company says. The latest smartphone from POCO is the company’s most promising, elegant, and commanding device to date, allowing users to switch their smartphone experience a level up, it adds.

Integrated with a flagship MediaTek chipset, physical pop-up Maglev triggers, Turbo Amoled with a 120Hz refresh rate and a 480Hz touch sampling rate, POCO F3 GT offers a premium experience. It’s a premium smartphone that transforms into a gaming beast, at a flick of a switch and is a perfect example of the best of both worlds fitted in one.

POCO F3 GT is available in two color variants: Gunmetal Silver and Predator Black across authorized stores.

Shivam Cement Ltd, based in Hetauda-16, has allegedly failed to pay Rs. 2.34 billion in electricity tariffs to the Nepal Electricity Authority (NEA). The said amount has accumulated over the past five years as Shivam failed to pay the charges of using NEA Hetauda distribution center’s dedicated feeder power line.

The NEA has repeatedly sent letters to the company to clear its dues but, apparently, it still has not been able to cut off Shivam’s power supply.

Meanwhile, the company has claimed that NEA Hetauda has been spreading propaganda against the public limited company. Lekhnath Aryal, company secretary and spokesperson, told the media that the company has been paying its electricity tariffs on time.

Further, the company claims that it has never requested for a dedicated feeder, nor has it ever received 24-hours uninterrupted power during load-shedding days. The industry ran on diesel back in those days, says the company.

The Electricity Tariff Assessment Commission had fixed the tariff for dedicated feeder users at about 67 percent higher than the regular rate in January 2016. The users would get continuous electricity even during load-shedding. Shivam argues that the rate fixed by the Tariff Assessment Commission does not apply to the company as it was never activated.

Following the split in the Nepal Communist Party, all three of its splinters—CPN-UML, CPN-UML Samajbadi, and CPN (Maoist Center)—have revived their respective militant youth wings. The UML now has Youth Force, the UML has Samajbadi People’s Volunteer, and the Maoists, the Young Communist League (YCL). Similar rationales are being offered for their revival: to help the country overcome the Covid-19 crisis, to carry out social work, and to help the party mobilize during the upcoming elections. Yet these youth wings are likely to serve a different purpose.

The YCL, partly formed with the induction of erstwhile Maoist PLA fighters, was notorious for its intimidation tactics. When the mother party formally entered mainstream politics in 2006, it had to disband the PLA. Party leaders feared traditional parliamentary forces could see this as the Maoist party’s emasculation, making them further strengthen the YCL as a backup militant force. When the CPN (Maoist) romped home to victory in the 2008 elections, the CPN-UML, traditionally the country’s biggest communist force, suspected the YCL’s intimidation tactics of prospective voters and donors had borne fruit.

So it formed its own youth wing in the YCL’s image. Some other Madhesi parties also copied the YCL model. As was expected, they jostled to protect the interest of their mother parties and often clashed. They started shaking down businessmen for donations, even as they, and the YCL in particular, purportedly wanted to eliminate all forms of political corruption from Nepal. Moreover, in the name of assisting the police to maintain law and order, these forces often became a law unto themselves.  

For all these reasons, the revival of these militant groups is troubling as the country prepares for another electoral cycle; constitutionally, all three levels of elections must be completed by November 2022. Going by their history, these groups will be used to forcibly collect donations and intimidate rival cadres and voters. The proliferation of such militant groups with the official sanction of political parties is not a healthy development for Nepal’s democratic process. It is also a bad omen for the prospect of free and fair elections. 

Dhaka international film festival’s ‘West Meets East Screenplay Lab’ has selected the screenplay of a Nepali film, Putali Ko Sapana, as one of its grant and mentorship contenders. The lab, which was launched earlier this year, chose Kiran Pokharel’s script along with 11 other movies for the occasion.

Among the 11 screenplays selected, only three will receive grants and mentorship from the lab. The first, second, and third placeholders will be provided $5000, $3000, and $2000 respectively and the film concepts will be showcased at Dhaka’s ‘Film Hut’ program.

Putali Ko Sapana centers on a young girl questioning her gender identity as she finds herself trapped in an endless guerrilla warfare in the hills of Nepal.