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Sri Lanka is currently going through an extreme economic crisis. Foreign exchange reserves have fallen so low that school examinations have been indefinitely postponed due to a lack of imported paper. In addition to cooking gas, there has been a shortage of kerosene and petrol. Blackout has started due to a lack of electricity.

Due to inflation, high unemployment, and shortages of almost all necessities, many Sri Lankans are fleeing the country in the hope of a better life abroad. Countless Sri Lankans are now being forced to do something other than their main occupation as not everyone can afford to leave.

The country has never been in such a bad situation since its independence in 1947. To cope, the Sri Lankan government has asked for a new loan of $1.5bn from neighboring India. When Sri Lanka faced problems, Bangladesh provided $250m in currency assistance. This was the first loan from Bangladesh for any country. Sri Lanka has been repaying loans of different countries with goods not money.

Sri Lanka had good enough human resources and prosperity. Then what prompted the crisis?

The country has undertaken several mega projects in recent times. These include seaports, airports, roads, and other projects considered unnecessary. Different governments of Sri Lanka have taken loans from different sources both at home and abroad. As a result, their foreign exchange reserves gradually dried out. There has been little foreign direct investment in Sri Lanka in the past 15 years. Instead, various governments have focused on borrowing.

The country’s government has been issuing sovereign bonds to raise money since 2007. These sovereign bonds are sold in international capital markets when expenditures exceed incomes. That is what Sri Lanka has done without thinking of how the money would be paid. At present, Sri Lanka has a debt of $12.5bn just in bonds. Besides, the government has also borrowed from domestic sources.

The once-self-sufficient country is also in dire straits due to tax cuts, reduced income from tourism and remittance, and ad hocism in agriculture.

The global economic climate has begun to change rapidly since the Russia-Ukraine war and, just like Sri Lanka, any country could fall into a new crisis.

Pakistan’s economy is also in turmoil, with its debts amounting to $130bn. Its inflation is now around 12 percent. The country’s recent political unrest has shaken business and industrial sectors. The economy was already fragile due to the depreciation of the rupee, declining reserves, rising commodity prices, and revenue shortfalls.

Not only has the currency depreciated, but the wheels of Pakistan’s economy have also slowed over the past three years.  

During Imran Khan’s premiership, there was an increase in debt, inflation, and a record fall in the value of the Pakistani currency.

In contrast, Bangladesh is currently South Asia’s development poster child. Big projects are being implemented. Development has reached villages. Most roads in the capital have flyovers and soon there will be a metro system. The Padma bridge is no longer a dream. Economists reckon the GDP growth rate could increase by a percent after the bridge’s construction. The implementation of such a mammoth project with the government’s own funding was at one time unimaginable.

The present government in Bangladesh has shown prudence and foresight. Hundred new economic zones are being formed. Investment is streaming in. Foreign exchange reserves are adequate ($45bn), and remittances are satisfactory. Bangladesh has strong economic foundations. The foreign exchange reserve will meet its import cost for six months. Sri Lanka, on the other hand, has less than $2bn, which is not enough to sustain even a fortnight’s imports.

Sri Lanka has seen unnecessary development projects backed by loans. The organic agriculture sector has come to a standstill and the public welfare system has been trimmed.

Due to the coronavirus pandemic, Bangladesh’s growth slowed down but it was still respectable compared to what we see in the rest of the world.

Bangladesh is a miracle story while Sri Lanka and Pakistan are disaster tales.

The author is a researcher and strategic and international affairs analyst. He has a Master’s degree in international relations from Jawaharlal Nehru University

The coronavirus pandemic and the omicron waves have put frontline sanitary workers, mainly those working in public toilets in the Kathmandu Valley, under increased public gaze. This write-up aims to bring to the fore a typical workday of these workers tasked with both sanitary and managerial roles through a brief conversation with two workers stationed at a public loo.

Sanitary staff of public loos, especially of those located at nerve centers like Ratnapark, are early birds. A typical workday starts at around 5 am and ends tentatively at 9 pm, says Rabin KC. The first of the users arrive quite early, but they are few and far between. The users may be cleaners of public buses, owners of tea stalls, drivers, etc.

The first round of cleaning is over by 7 am, says KC. As for the use of personal protective equipment (PPE), KC says: There’s no question of doing the cleaning work without putting on safety gear like gloves, boots and mask.

Apart from the public toilet at Ratnapark, his work stations include addresses like Pokhara Dohori Saanjh, Fewa Dohori Saanjh, Ebizza and Fire (all located in Thamel), not to mention hospitals where sanitary workers have to put on heavy overalls equipped with boots and gloves while at work, running a sweat all along.

Do the workers have to buy those safety gears or do the contractors provide them?

KC says the contractors provide the gears. That’s some relief for these workers, especially in trying times like the current pandemic.

Asked about the behavior of users of the loo at Ratnapark, KC turns a bit critical.

Out of 100 users, 15 to 20 don’t clean up after their acts—they don’t pour water even when they are done, causing inconvenience to others streaming in—observes KC.

Rajan Deula, stationed at the same loo, joins in: Out of every 10 users, only 2-3 people clean the fecal matter with water. What does this reveal about our health and hygiene standards?

By the way, this is not for want of water, he adds: The nearby well has dried up, so we buy tanker water to keep the public loo clean.

The public loo with hot water facilities for bathing used to pull crowds. With hot water no longer available, the crowd has thinned. Nowadays, a handful of cleaners and drivers come for bathing once a week or so, per Deula.

Back to the user behavior. Despite our constant encouragement to pour water before and after use, the users pay no heed, KC laments, referring to the 15-20 percent bracket.

That’s not the end of problematic behavior at the public loos, though.

About 20 percent of users still spit paan, other tobacco products and throw cigarette butts. Out of every 100 or so users, five to 10 come smoking, says Deula.

In the past, some women users used to dispose of sanitary pads inside the toilet and not in the bin, according to KC. Such incidents used to cause blockages necessitating major repairs, each costing up to Rs 4,000, per KC. Such acts are rare these days, much to the relief of sanitary staff and users alike.

Differently-abled people, staff of the Kathmandu Metropolitan City (KMC) and personnel from the Nepal Army and the Nepal Police, including the Traffic Police, get services for free, according to KC and Deula.

Some users try to slip out without paying, says KC. This happens when traffic is heavy, on occasions like protests and big festivals.

That means more revenue than on normal days? Not necessarily. KC offers an interesting insight.

At such times, 15-20 percent users leave without paying, KC offers a rough estimate. The lack of CCTV cameras has only helped those slippery creatures by offering an easy escape. When sought money for using the loo, some people falsely identify themselves as metropolitan staff, security personnel and refuse to pay, Deula points out.

Average daily income? Deula says it is well within the range of Rs 2,000-2,500.

Despite the public health challenges that seem to be growing even in post-pandemic situations, Deula says with confidence, KC firmly by his side: There’s no problem in operating the public toilet by maintaining the standards of safety.

Their confidence notwithstanding, it is necessary to conduct regular training for sanitary staff in view of emerging health challenges where our public toilets can easily become epicenters of diseases. However, it’s not only frontline sanitary staff who need training.

Drawing from the experiences of Deula and KC, it can be said that toilet training for users is absolutely necessary, regardless of their age and gender, to improve the condition of public toilets, apart from provisions for punitive action against errant behavior.

Asked about the role of government entities in improving the condition of public toilets, Deula shoots, point-blank: The KMC collects land rent, it doesn’t do much else.

Hopefully, toilet training for users and government entities (with the main focus on effective ways to run these infrastructure so critical to public health and well-being) will enable sanitary staff like KC and Deula to feel a bit less sad and tired when they leave for home from work at the end of a typically long and hard workday.

I get the jitters when I visit hospitals, whether it’s to see a family member, a friend, or for some other reason. I have never been hospitalized in my life. Call it the irony of it all—a week back, I was at the BP Memorial Teaching Hospital, fidgeting in a chair in nervous anticipation outside the OT (operation theater). My wife sat beside me.

After the age of 45, most people need reading glasses. I did after 50, nothing abnormal, only age-related—presbyopia, the doctor said. But things changed. My vision for distance seemed to fall in my mid-sixties—nothing to fret about; I got power lenses for nearsightedness.

After a year, I seemed to have problems with my right eye—blurry vision, even with glasses. I saw the doctor again. He diagnosed my right eye with macular edema: fluid build-up in the macula, in the center of the retina.

Nothing alarming; it’s in its early stages. However, as I had underlying conditions like diabetes and hypertension, timely medication was advisable. The doctor said I needed to take three injections in the eye, one each month—the sooner, the better.

The doctor further added that as the clinic did not have the required facilities, he would administer the injection at the hospital where he worked—in the operation theater. That scared the wits out of me.

Since the new coronavirus variant had hit Kathmandu hard, my wife and I felt edgy when we got off the cab at the hospital. Thank the stars—there was no crowd, only one patient in the OT lounge. He sat beside his wife, all masked up, just like we were.

As we struck a conversation, he told me he had come for his third and last shot. Curious, I asked if the previous injections helped. He sounded confident the medication had improved his vision by 90 percent.

As we waited, the nurse at the counter approached and marked our eyelids with sticky paper tape—his left and mine right, and asked us to wait. She appeared to be the only staff member and seemed stressed, as she did not seem forthcoming when I asked some questions.

A little later, another nurse joined her, and the reason for her brusque manner became clear. She was lamenting about a problem at home to her fellow sister: the coronavirus had struck four of her family members. Still, she had to report for duty—she moaned.

Time seemed to drag on leaden feet as we sat tight. The sister at long last approached and asked us to put on gowns and shed our shoes. She then ushered us into the glass door with the ominous-looking letters—OT (Operation Theater).

The room was a small cubicle with the operating room behind a glass partition. The nurse asked me to wait as the other patient entered. I had a partial view of the main chamber through the glass.

A TV screen hung by a wall as the room seemed busy with masked nurses and staff pacing back and forth in green gowns and surgical skull caps. I could not see the doctor, but the room seemed to buzz with several young fellows who appeared like interns.

I sat tight with muddled thoughts and butterflies in my stomach. As my eyes fell on the TV screen through the glass partition, it showed a film on what looked like an eye operation.

Then I got a nasty jolt—it was not just a random film but live footage of the fellow patient with me a little earlier. I cringed and hurriedly averted my eyes as a gloved hand approached with a hypodermic syringe.

In barely 20 minutes, it was over, and the nurse summoned me. I was in a stupor as I lay on the operating table. I do not precisely recall what happened next as I got blinded by the glare of the surgical light—I just had blurry images that looked like gloved hands briskly working on my eye.

Before I knew it, it was all over: no pain, no sensation of the needle—nothing. The doctor told me to see him after three weeks. The ordeal was over.  

Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba just completed a three-day official visit to India upon the invitation of Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Since the visit was arranged in a short period, there were anxieties and speculations in Nepali media on its purpose, even though regular exchange of high-level visits has been an integral component of bilateral ties. The visit happened two days after the Chinese Foreign minister Wang Yi’s three-day trip to Kathmandu and one day after the BIMSTEC meeting.

It also took place on the backdrop of Nepali parliament’s ratification of the US-funded MCC compact, which was strongly resisted by the front organizations of left parties. Most interestingly, while both extra-regional powers—the US and China—have been competing for strategic space by offering special development packages to Nepal under the BRI and the MCC, India has adopted a more astute diplomacy.

The MCC compact perhaps was not a major concern for India given its broad strategic-level partnership with the US globally and the latter’s acknowledgment of India’s geographical advantage in the region. Moreover, as per their 13 January 2017 joint statement, India and the US share a commitment to promoting economic growth, development, regional cooperation and connectivity under the MCC.

As far as the BRI is concerned, India might have felt more comfortable after the formation of a new government in Kathmandu under Deuba. Prime Minister Deuba categorically urged the Chinese to develop projects under the BRI ‘only under grant and aid assistance or through investment’. Moreover, Chinese influence in Nepal has been waning since the Supreme Court’s scrapping of the Nepal Communist Party. China failed to prevent the MCC’s passage despite using all its diplomatic, soft power, and coercive tools, going to the extent of effectively blocking the two China-Nepal trading points since the onset of the MCC debate in Nepal.

Given the closeness and warmth in bilateral relations and their mutual dependency, this kind of high-level visit was overdue. It happened after a gap of four years and following wrangling over border issues since November 2019. There was a vacuum in political communications after Nepal’s issuance of a new political map in May 2020. Although some high-level official visits happened after the map’s ratification.

Another driving factor behind the visit could be the pressing need to support each other in tackling a looming energy crisis in the subcontinent due to the Ukrainian conflict. Although Nepal depends on India, both for electricity and fossil fuel, in the long term, India needs the support of Nepal to achieve its Paris and Glasgow commitments on climate change and to realize Prime Minister Modi’s vision of “One Sun One World One Grid”. Therefore, of the four agreements signed during PM Deuba’s visit, two were related to energy including one concerning Nepal’s joining of the India-led Global Solar Alliance. The other one was an exchange of agreement on the supply of petroleum products between the IOC and the NOC.

This visit stood out from other more recent high-level visits from Nepal, as it went beyond routine delegation-level meetings and signing of MoUs. The first attraction of the visit was PM Deuba’s trip to the BJP headquarters. This was the first time a Nepali prime minister officially visited the party office of the ruling Indian party. It suggests a deep level of relationship as well as political maturity of the Nepali Congress and the BJP, both of which strongly believe in multiparty democracy, democratic values, norms, and constitutionalism.

Moreover, despite the many similarities between the NC and the BJP, there was no party-to-party MoU, unlike between the then NCP and the Chinese Communist Party in September 2019. This again shows that each party respects the independent functioning of the other and avoids imposing its values. This visit also sent a message to other Nepali political parties that the NC could be the priority party of the BJP in Kathmandu.

Another important part of PM Deuba’s India visit was his Varanasi sojourn. Uttar Pradesh has a special relationship with Nepal given its geographical contiguity, cultural linkages, as well as its status as an educational hub for many Nepalis. Most importantly, it is the birth center of the democratic movement in Nepal. Most Hindu Nepalis believe that taking a holy dip in the Ganges in Varanasi could help them achieve salvation. The only Nepal study center in India is located at Banaras Hindu University.

The Varanasi visit again shows that India has upgraded high-level visits from Nepal to the level of those from major countries like Japan, the US, and China. High-level visits from these countries since 2014 were hosted in provincial cities like Varanasi, Ahmedabad, and Mamallapuram respectively. PM Deuba was received by UP Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath and thousands of other city dwellers and cheering students standing by the roadside. This too was a first in Nepal-India relations.

Although PM Deuba stayed in India for under 72 hours, the visit was well received by people of both the countries. During their joint press briefing, both leaders acknowledged fruitful discussions on wide-ranging issues. They reviewed progress in implementation of Indian projects in Nepal and agreed to further deepen and facilitate trade, energy, investment, and connectivity ties. In another major achievement of the visit, India acknowledged Nepal as one of the main pillars of its ‘neighborhood first’ policy.