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The Election Commission (EC) has stated that a trustworthy security environment for the upcoming House of Representatives (HoR) polls will be created for the political parties, candidates, and voters alike.

EC Spokesperson Narayan Prasad Bhattarai said that a robust security situation would be ensured for the political parties and candidates to visit the voters for the election campaigns and for the voters to cast their votes.

Spokesperson Bhattarai made it clear that all four security agencies were working in a coordinated fashion as per the integrated security planning and the government was also providing resources for the polls. 

The political parties, candidates, and campaigners enjoy the situation to visit the voters and take their views to the people in a fearless manner, he added.

As the winter season gets colder, the tourist excitement in the religious and touristic district of Mustang has started to decline. As the winter season approaches, hotels in the district headquarters Jomsom and hotels operating on the national highway, including the hotels, are facing downfall.

Recently, as the Beni-Jomsom road has become easier, some tourism entrepreneurs have been waiting for tourists. As the winter season gets colder, the Pokhara-Jomsom air service was also suspended a month in advance. The pressure of tourist vehicles on the national highway road is also very low.

According to RSS, The first snowfall of this season occurred in Upper Mustang last October, while there has been no snowfall in Lower Mustang. However, the extreme cold and the effect of the northern wind have affected people’s lives here. As the winter season begins, the temperature in Upper Mustang has dropped to -20 degrees Celsius in the morning and evening, and in Lower Mustang to -10 degrees Celsius.

Due to the effects of the northerly winds of winter, local residents are unable to move outside easily. Even though the weather is sunny in the afternoon, the cold wind has started blowing along with the northerly winds, which has affected daily life.

As the residents there have locked themselves in their homes and gone down to the valley to escape the cold, Upper Mustang has become completely deserted, said Umesh Poudel, head of the ACAP Lomanthang office to RSS. Although the hotels in Muktinath located here are open, there is no tourist activity.

With the extreme cold of winter, the rivers, branches, taps of houses, irrigation canals and safety tanks of houses in Upper Mustang have frozen and formed ice, affecting the daily lives of the local citizens there. The cold has been affecting the health of the local citizens who have not descended to the valley to escape the winter. In Lower Mustang, local farmers are enduring the extreme cold and are engaged in apple orchard management work.

The number of foreign tourist arrivals in January has increased by 5,559 or 54 percent compared to December. According to police sources, it is said that one to one and a half hundred tourists still come to Mustang daily via the Beni-Jomsom road.  According to the tourism records of the District Police Office, when comparing the tourist arrivals from July-December of the last fiscal year, it is seen that the tourist arrivals from the same month of the current fiscal year have decreased by 10.05 percent. 

The Kaligandaki Rural Municipality in Syangja has decided to provide financial assistance to families giving birth to three children.

The rural municipality has decided to provide financial assistance from the current fiscal year to families who have three children in order to prevent the declining population rate.

Chairman of the rural municipality, Khim Bahadur Thapa, said that recently, due to the decreasing population, it has become challenging to maintain population balance in the long term, which is why the rural municipality has taken this step.

“The population within the rural municipality is decreasing, and over time, the number of people in the village could become quite low.  In view of this, we have moved forward with the aim of stopping the declining population rate, providing families with positive motivation towards giving birth to children, maintaining long-term population balance, and implementing nutrition-friendly local governance,” he said.

He stated that the rural municipality has approved the procedure for providing financial assistance to families who give birth to three children and is preparing to provide financial aid to families who meet the criteria set in the procedure.

According to the procedure approved by the rural municipality, families permanently residing within the rural municipality who have had a third child after the month of Shrawan in the current fiscal year must submit an application along with the necessary documents to the concerned ward office.

Recently, the villages have started to empty as people are having only one or two children and, on the other hand, migrating from villages to cities.

“The rural municipality provides financial assistance of Rs 4,000 per month to families who have three children according to the procedure. The support is intended as a positive incentive for nurturing and caring for children, given to each family for up to two years,” Thapa said.

Singer and actor Prashant Tamang passed away at the age of 43 on Sunday. 

According to film critic Rajesh Ghatani, who was close to Tamang, he died  at his residence in Delhi. 

‘He passed away this morning at his apartment in Delhi,’ Ghatani told an online news portal, "The cause of death was suspected to be a heart attack,” he added. 

Tamang rose to fame after  winning the third  edition of Indian Idol, a popular singing Indian reality show. He later sang for several Nepali films. 

He made his acting debut in Nepali films with ‘Gorkhapaltan 2’ directed by Narayan Rayamajhi. 

He worked as a playback singer for a Nepali film for the first time with ‘Himmat 2’.

Born in Darjeeling, India, Tamang married air hostess Martha Elly in 2011. They have a daughter. 

After the news of Tamang’s death, condolences are pouring in on social media.

Veteran actor and comedian T.K. Carter, known for his roles in The Thing and the television series Punky Brewster, has died at the age of 69, authorities said. Carter was pronounced dead Friday evening after sheriff’s deputies responded to a report of an unresponsive man at a residence in Duarte, California. Officials said no foul play is suspected, and the cause of death was not disclosed.

Born Thomas Kent Carter in New York City and raised in Southern California, he began his career in stand-up comedy before moving into film and television. His breakout role came in John Carpenter’s 1982 cult horror classic The Thing, where he played Nauls, the base cook. He later became a familiar face on television in the 1980s.

Carter also appeared in films including Runaway Train, Ski Patrol and Space Jam, leaving behind a diverse body of work.

Authorities in New Mexico have issued an arrest warrant for director and Emmy Award-winning actor Timothy Busfield in connection with alleged child sex abuse, police said Friday. The warrant follows a complaint filed by an Albuquerque Police Department investigator accusing Busfield of inappropriate sexual contact with a minor on the set of the television series The Cleaning Lady.

The complaint includes that the child alleged the incidents occurred when he was 7 and 8 years old, between late 2022 and early 2024. The child’s mother reported the allegations to Child Protective Services, prompting an investigation that began in November 2024 after a referral from a hospital doctor.

The warrant lists two counts of criminal sexual contact of a minor. Court documents say the child has since been diagnosed with anxiety and post-traumatic stress disorder.

Busfield’s attorney and agent did not immediately respond to requests for comment. The actor has denied the allegations through legal filings.

Bob Weir, guitarist, singer and founding force of the Grateful Dead, has died at the age of 78, his family announced Saturday. A statement shared on Weir’s Instagram said he passed away peacefully, surrounded by loved ones, after surviving cancer but later facing complications related to lung illness.

Weir joined the band, then known as the Warlocks, in San Francisco in 1965 when he was just 17. Alongside Jerry Garcia, he helped shape the band’s signature sound through decades of relentless touring and improvisational live shows that defined the 1960s counterculture and beyond.

He wrote or co-wrote enduring songs such as Sugar Magnolia, One More Saturday Night and Mexicali Blues. After Garcia’s death in 1995, Weir became the band’s most visible torchbearer, continuing its legacy through projects like Dead & Company.

Weir is remembered as a tireless performer whose music united generations of devoted fans.

A protester has climbed on to the balcony of the Iranian embassy in west London as hundreds gathered outside the building, waving flags and shouting anti-government slogans, BBC reported. 

The Metropolitan Police said two arrests had been made at the protest and that officers were also seeking another individual for trespass.

Anti-government protests erupted in Iran on 28 December, with two human rights groups reporting that at least 50 protesters have been killed, according to BBC.