News, Views From Nepal

The inherent character of political power is vying for control over resources. In the pursuit of control over more resources, rulers seek to centralise power and expand control in the larger range of territory. This is how empires are built. When the central authority weakens, the empire begins to crumble in a way Benjamin Franklin said ‘empire diminishes like a cake from the edges’. In this phenomenon of history, several empires came into being and eventually turned into footnotes of history. In the words of Colombia University professor Jeffrey Sachs, ‘an empire is a state that uses force to impose rulers on another country’. The empire building started with the dawn of civilization. Until the mid-20th century, empires were built by means of force, war, coercion and sabotage. Roman, Ottoman, Byzantine, Egyptian, Chinese, Russian, British and several other empires were built and vanished. The empire is the manifestation of centrality of international power. The empire bu...

  Yuba Nath Lamsal   “The woods are lovely, dark and deep, But I have promises to keep, And miles to go before I sleep, And miles to go before I sleep” —Robert Frost This is how American poet Robert Frost has described life as a journey. Life is truly a journey and we are all fellow travellers. The 27 years of association with The Rising Nepal was a precious part of my life's long journey, which is both bumpy and exciting. In this part of the journey, there are thousands of incidents that go deep down in memory lane. However, a few of them are so momentous that they always keep on chasing in my mind. Adieu to a man of principle That was the sombre night of April 26, 1999. Piercing through the serenity of darkness, an unusual mid-night call woke me up. That was the age of landline telephones as cellular phones were not available in Nepal. Half-awakened and a little scared, I rushed to the next room to attend the call anticipating something unusual and bizarre....

  Yuba Nath Lamsal ( Jan 12, 2022) Right from the time when Homo sapiens moved from African jungles to Asian and European landmass forming dots of civilizations, the concept of nationhood evolved. Since the first state evolved in Sumeria, (Tigris and Euphrates river basin in present Iraq), several states were born and disappeared from the map of the world. The process of birth and disappearance of states continues even now albeit in a slower pace. Human history is chequered. Humans have changed so is the world. But the basic nature of human beings remains unchanged — that is to live in a group and seek collective security. The fundamental human nature of living together in a group in a particular territory and in a collective manner is the foundation of the modern statehood. The world is interconnected and inter-dependent. The advancement of science and technology has reduced the world into a small global village. In this interconnected world, no single country is ful...

  Yuba Nath Lamsal The national congresses of three key parties – CPN-UML, Nepali Congress and Rastriya Prajatantra Party or RPP are over now. The other party CPN-Maoist Centre is also set to hold its congress in two weeks. There are some marked similarities in the congresses of the three parties. The congresses of all parties began with fanfare and hullaballoo and ended in a fuss. The parties had been expected to debate issues having direct bearing on the people and the country and come up with the policy tools to address them. Nothing such happened. The principal focus seemed to be on how to capture the leadership and secure party positions. Given the way the mega meetings were held, it is clear that our political parties are devoid of ideologies and principles. No debate was held on ideology, policies and programmes. Parties have become orphans of ideology. There has been marked dichotomy between principles and practice. None of the political parties practice what...

  Yuba Nath Lamsal Even as liberal democracy is said to be what Francis Fukuyama says ‘the default from of the government in much of the world’ a new study has revealed that more and more countries are experiencing a marked erosion in the state of democracy and are reverting slowly to authoritarian trend under the facade of democratic set-up. According to the study of International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (IDEA) on the state of democracy, 70 per cent of the global population currently lives either in non-democratic regimes or in democratically backsliding countries. Similarly, the Freedom House, which studies the health of the democracies in the world, says in its 2021 report that democracy is in a long recession. It says, “In every region of the world, democracy is under attack”. The Freedom House concluded that democracy declined in 73 countries in the world including India, while it slightly got better only in 28 countries. This global dem...