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No one knows the whereabouts of more than Rs 400 million raised in the name of flood victims of Khalanga, the Darchula district headquarters, which was flooded by the Mahakali eight years ago.

People from all over the country had raised money for the flood-victims in 2013. But with no proper audit, there has been no accounting of around Rs 400 million raised for the victims.

“Not a single penny fell into the hands of the victims,” says Raghubir Thagunna, secretary of the Mahakali Flood Victims Struggle Committee. “We were given Rs 35,000 as a relief. That was it. We don't know where the Rs 400 million raised in our name has gone.”

“Some of the money received from abroad was deposited into the Prime Minister's Relief Fund and some in the Central Disaster Relief Fund,” says Thagunna, whose two houses, a poultry farm, and land worth Rs 15 million were damaged by the devastating floods.

The Darchula district headquarters was flooded after India opened the sluices of the Dhauliganga Hydropower Project without any notice. After the Darchula floods, advance notice is sent to the Darchula District Administration Office when opening the gates of Dhauliganga. According to Ram Dutta Pant, clerk at Darchula District Administration Office (DAO), the Mahakali that year flooded the houses and land belonging to 113 people. Nearly Rs 1 billion worth of property was lost.

Thagunna alleged that the money raised by various political parties in the name of flood victims was spent on campaigning for elections. “We don't have data on who raised how much. The funds raised by the UML, the Congress, and the UCPN (Maoist), we suspect, may have been spent in the second Constituent Assembly election campaign. We did not get anything,” said Thagunna.

The struggle committee has been demanding compensation for the flood victims of Darchula. They have come to the capital many times by collecting donations. But the government is yet to heed their distress calls.

The DAO had prepared a booklet detailing the losses incurred by each victim. “The district administration has recorded the details of the damages caused by the Mahakali floods. We have not been compensated by the government, nor have we received the amount collected in our name,” complains Lalit Singh Bohora, another victim.

Bohora claims that more than Rs 500 million has been deposited to the Prime Minister's Relief Fund and the Central Disaster Relief Fund alone. “But we have been struggling for eight years to get that Rs 500 million. No one will give it to us,” Bohara said. “Even if we received that amount, it would be half of the compensation we deserve.”

In his budget speech for the fiscal year 2018/19, then finance minister Yubaraj Khatiwada had announced plans to provide a loan of up to Rs. 0.7 million to aspiring entrepreneurs by accepting their degree certificates as collateral. Since then, every year, speculations over the plan peak for a while during the budget period. Yet only a handful of people have benefitted from the scheme so far.

During the Panchayat period, then Prime Minister Kirti Nidhi Bista had first announced a plan to provide loans to educated but unemployed youths against their degree certificates to help them set up businesses. But the plan never took off. When Prakash Chandra Lohani, one of the key Panchayat figures, became finance minister in 2003, he resuscitated the idea. But his plans too were limited to paper.

In his budget speech for 2021/22, Finance Minister Bishnu Prasad Paudel once again announced loans of up to Rs. 2.5 million to aspiring entrepreneurs by accepting their university degree certificates as collateral.

Following Khatiwada’s announcement last year, Nepal Rastra Bank had issued a directive to banks to allow this kind of loan. According to the central bank, 142 project leads have taken out loans against their graduate certificates so far. “The loan amount has also increased from Rs. 0.7 million to Rs. 2.5 million,” says NRB Spokesperson Dev Kumar Dhakal. The NRB is now coming up with a new directive to implement Finance Minister Paudel’s program, says Dhakal

Any unemployed individual with a Bachelor’s degree can apply for a loan, officials say. If a bank trusts the business plan, it can issue the loan. Dhakal adds, “The bank should be convinced that the business plan is promising.”

That only a handful of people have benefitted from the project shows that the scheme is problematic, says former Finance Secretary Rameshore Khanal. In addition to the complicated directives from the central bank, Nepali banks don’t have human resources to assess the feasibility of business plans. If someone comes with an idea and submits a proposal to a bank, the proposal cannot be properly accessed. “Without proper infrastructures and human resources, we can’t expect any such scheme to succeed,” he adds.

Even for those selected under the scheme, the banks offer them loans in installments rather than a lump sum. “Just as you get installments to complete your home affected by the quake, you get installments from the bank only after you show the bank your project’s progress,” says Dhakal.

Bank representatives inspect the project periodically to decide whether to issue the next installment. Also, the bank may also choose to issue the payment to the concerned business instead of the individual loan-taker so that the fund is not misused.

In other countries where such programs have been implemented, if a skilled person asks for a loan against their academic credentials, the bank helps them prepare a proposal. The banks themselves provide alternative startup plans, if required. For instance, PayPal was a startup proposal financed by a commercial bank. “We don’t see the same spirit and system in Nepal,” adds Khanal.

“Not a single Nepali bank has the mechanism to investigate the future of a project or a startup,” he says, adding the only thing our banks do is evaluate physical collateral and issue loans accordingly.

Govinda Aryal, a resident of Butwal, has a strange experience to share regarding the loan. In 2019, when he approached Nepal Bank Limited for a loan against his certificates, the manager told him that he could get the loan only against something valuable. Acharya explains, “This might have happened as the loan quota may already have been exhausted.”

NRB has provided a quota of 500 and 300 to commercial and development banks respectively for this kind of loan. But banks are still reluctant as they are far from assured they can recover their money if the business fails. “To make every concerned body comfortable, we are working on a new directive,” Acharya tells ApEx.

Most people think this loan system will only benefit political workers, and Khanal is one of the skeptics. “To get a loan against educational certificates in Nepal, either you have to be rich or you should have political backing,” he says.

Until a decade ago, it used to take about an hour and a half to reach Lumbini from Butwal via Bhairahawa. Narrow and bumpy roads greeted visitors to Lumbini, called a tourist city.

Anyone returning to this region after a decade will be surprised by the changes in Butwal, Bhairahawa, and Lumbini. The first thing they will notice is that the road from Butwal to Belahiya and Buddhachowk to Lumbini has been widened.

The construction of the six-lane road has shortened the distance between Bhairahawa, Tilottama, and Butwal, where a megacity is being planned. Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Bishnu Poudel has already allocated a budget for the plan to develop the area into a megacity. Sainamana, Shuddhodhan, Siyari, and Omasatiya villages will also be connected to this city.

Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Poudel, people's representative from, Rupendehi Constituency No 2, has been saying that Rupendehi will be made a model of development.

Butwal sub-metropolitan chief Shivaraj Subedi says the area east of Bardaghat west of Char Number will be incorporated into the megacity. The city will be extended to Saljandi Farsatikar and Amuwa.

However, experts say that officials need to maintain uniformity in the development of infrastructure. Yuvaraj Kandel, a scholar from Butwal, says that for the Butwal to become a megacity, there should be a uniformity in the infrastructure to be built in all the current municipalities.

"In particular, the budget needs to be allocated in such a way that infrastructure development is uniform and the metropolitan development authority is in control," he said. "If there is no uniformity in development, it will be difficult to develop a megacity."

Finance Minister Poudel has allocated a budget to lay underground power transmission cables in Butwal. This will help maintain the aesthetics of the city as overhead cabling has been seen as a bane for cities in Nepal.

Butwal sub-metropolis plans to develop the area as a green city. A tree plantation program has been launched to make road dividers green. There are plans to develop the Tinau-Danau corridor as a green corridor. At the same time, plans are being formulated to develop the Belbas-Bethari road in a similar fashion.

Traffic lights have been installed in Tilottama to make the city modern and safe. Tilottama’s Mayor Vasudev Ghimire says, "Work has been started from Manigram in the first phase of the road safety program."

Traffic lights will also be installed in Butwal and Bhairahawa. In Butwal, a modern model auto and transport village to manage freight vehicles and prevent unnecessary crowding of the city.

Sanamina municipality has started the construction of a modern landfill site in cooperation with neighboring municipalities. "Sanamina's landfill site plays an important role in waste management," said Mayor Chitra Bahadur Karki. "Even the waste of neighboring municipalities will be managed here."

There are plans to run electric buses to connect Butwal to Bhairahawa and Lumbini. There are plans to run electric buses in Lumbini as well. However, it’s yet to come into operation.

The International Conference Center being constructed in Butwal, and Bhairahawa Airport will make Butwal and Bhairahawa more cosmopolitan.

Drinking water for the densely populated city of the future is also being planned. The Jhumsa Khola Drinking Water Project will bring in more than 30 million liters of water to Butwal daily. Siddhababa's tunnel route and Kaligandaki-Tinau diversion will also make the city more attractive. 

A medium-sized bunch of lettuce costs Rs 30 at the local vegetable market. The organic version of the same, depending on the seller, is priced anywhere between Rs 75 to Rs 150. These days, many people prefer the latter because organic food is supposedly free from pesticides, nutrient-rich, and thus healthier. But is it really as good as we think it is? Experts say there actually isn’t much nutritional difference between organic food and their conventional counterparts.

Dietician Kala Nepal says the impact of organic food on health and disease prevention isn’t significant. Various studies suggested people who consumed organic food have relatively lower risk of heart disease and skin problems but the subjects also followed better lifestyles. Nepal says good health in such cases cannot be attributed to the consumption of organic food alone.

Kala Nepal

“There have been quite a few studies examining the macro- and micronutrient content of food. The vitamins and minerals content are found to be similar in both organically and conventionally grown food," says Nepal.

Food, according to Nepal, needs to be affordable and accessible. While choosing what to eat, we have to factor in its practicability. It’s not possible to get organic versions of everything we eat on a daily basis. Organic food is also more expensive. There are a number of reasons for that: There is less production, it needs more manpower, and it costs money to get certified as organic. Is the extra expense worth it? The answer is no.

Anushree Acharya, dietician and MD, The Nutrition Cure Nepal, says most of us are just paying for the ‘organic’ tag. There are some companies that are following the required protocols but many others are just labeling their products organic to sell them at higher prices. Unfortunately, there is no way to tell what’s genuine and what’s not.

Anushree Acharya

According to Mohan Krishna Maharjan, senior food research officer and spokesperson at Department of Food Technology and Quality Control, there is no monitoring of the organic market in Nepal. The government has set some guidelines for organic food production and organic products do need a third-party certification. The thing is, no one checks if companies are following the rules.

Maharjan explains growing organic crops involves managing many external factors. The soil has to be pesticide-free for a certain number of years and the environment has to be an isolated one. If you are growing something without synthetic fertilizers at a certain place but pesticides are being used in the surrounding areas, then your crops aren’t organic.

Food technologist Ujjal Rayamajhi says there are a few organic farms in Kathmandu that are abiding by at least some government-set criteria but then again there is no monitoring to guarantee full compliance. Also, the government is trying to support those that follow good agricultural practices. But there is a need for proper rules and regulations to make sure the organic food available in the market today meet the required standards. Unless there’s a system in place, the public runs the risk of paying high rates for substandard products.

Ujjal Rayamajhi

Our focus in the meanwhile, dietician Acharya says, should be on eating healthy by using what’s locally available to us rather than letting our food choices be driven by marketing gimmicks. Acharya sees a lot of people having organic teas or certain seeds (like flax and chia seeds) because the packaging declares it’s good for such-and-such conditions or because someone they know vouches for its efficacy.

News of pesticide-laden fruits and vegetables in the market also fuel our interest in organic produce. Experts say that though this is something the government needs to look into to ensure public safety in the long run, there really is no need to be alarmed and completely switch to organic food.

What we need to understand, they say, is that growing and preserving crops without using chemical fertilizers is almost impossible today. There is also a toxicity limit to the use of pesticides in agriculture and as long as that is followed conventionally grown food is safe for consumption.

There are also, says Nepal, simple ways to lessen the pesticide content in our food. Soaking grains, fruits and vegetables in a solution of baking soda is effective in removing much of the pesticides present in them. Similarly, Acharya adds you can immerse food in salt water for at least 15 to 20 minutes to let toxins leach out. Other ways to remove toxins from food include scrubbing your produce and cooking without a lid on.

Aarem Karkee, dietician at Patan Hospital in Lalitpur, says the main dietary issue we need to focus on isn’t whether we are eating food that is grown using pesticides and synthetic fertilizers. The top 10 reasons for mortality, including heart diseases, diabetes, and cancer, are all linked to our consumption of refined and fast food. The emphasis, he says, should thus be on changing the kind of food we eat—meaning we should eat more whole foods rather than the processed and packaged kind.

Aarem Karkee

“If you ask me whether you should be eating greens that you know have been sprayed with pesticides, then my answer is a resounding yes,” says Karkee adding that the benefits of having fruits and vegetables, despite their chemical content, far outweigh the risks.

Fellow dieticians Acharya and Nepal both agree with Karkee and say the key to eating healthy lies in making sensible food choices. Eating what’s in season is also one way of a relatively toxin-free lifestyle. So is understanding your food: Produce with thicker skins tend to have fewer pesticide residues. The thick skin or peel protects the inner fruit or vegetable. If you remove the skin or peel, then you are essentially removing much of the residue.

Nepal also mentions that we tend to choose fruits and vegetables that are glossy and don’t have a single mark on them but that’s not really what you should be doing. Instead, she suggests, look for ones that aren’t so perfect. If you see insects or some damage, that’s an indicator that they were cultivated using less fertilizers and chemicals.

Further, Acharya adds that there are many practical ways in which you can have a toxin-free, healthy diet. You just have to be willing to look beyond the fads and experiment with different types of food as well as be a little aware about the kinds of nutrients available in different kinds of products. For example, she says, it’s not necessary to have avocados and nuts for your daily dose of omega-3s. Ghee and cooking oil (like olive oil) are also great sources of unsaturated fatty acids.

“Eating organic food isn’t the ultimate way to good health as it’s often made out to be these days,” she concludes.