This 3 day Nepal bandh (total shutdown of country). This is blackmail.

December 20th, 2009

Are you looking forward to this 3-day bandh, Sunday, Monday, Tuesday? (Total shutdown of Nepal)
What say to the sorry fact that a few big egos with no-one’s interests at heart but their own, will oppress you for three long days with the threat of some cheap several-hundred-rupee-per-day-hired-goons. Who benefits from this? Can bullying create lasting change? After 15+ years of bandhs, does it have the power of ’shock and awe’ any more? This stinks. This is terrorism on the street corner and the masses lie down and swallow it as a part of life in :New Nepal.  But wait a minute…. Are you thinking….
  • Its not my job to stop it ?
  • I am helpless to face up to it myself, what can I do?
    or
  • So what, its just a few days, I can wait it out?
  • I am lazy, I am a coward, I am average….?
Is there really *nothing* we, you, I, me, he, she, they can do? Aren’t you feeling helpless, pathetic, angry? What? You don’t care?
Visualize this,
“If you think you are too small to make a difference, try sleeping in a room with a mosquito.” Someone wise person said that. You all know its true.
Here’s a suggestion. Instead of looking for the nuclear bomb that will wipe bandhs from the face of history tomorrow, let’s take it slowly, be creative, be surprising, reject the shouting, chest beating old-school ways, and have a lot of sneaky fun. Sounds like an ideal romance, no? Let’s start by giving a hint of the steam in this youthful pressure cooker. Start by making small cracks in the wall of nonsense. Lets find new ways to deal with this mob.
Here are some ideas floated by fellow activists in the Facebook Group “Die Nepal Bandh Die”. Join it if you believe in the cause and recommend others.
START THINKING!

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“What about ‘Flash Mob’”?, asked a few people – showing the strength of the silent majority without violence. Know what it is? An sms alert brings a huge mass of people together at short notice at a specific location with secret instructions. Then disperse immediately after the action is over.
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“Exposing faces behind the mob”, suggested another. Get snapping pictures of bandh enforcers now, and start posting pictures on this and other forums. This is one small way of empowering ourselves and see the faces behind this destructive forms of protests.
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Phone jamming – “if you get 1000 people to call every party head office and express their one sentence opinion on bandh, and then hang up. would be fun no?”
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Email the editors – Another suggested, “Mass send emails to the editors of the mass media in Nepal. ‘Please publish on letters page: Dear Sir/Madam, I am 23 from Lalitpur and I want to express my view on the bandh culture which is a hand at the throat of this nation…”.
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“A bandh day football tournament on tundikel, mass random cricket competition in the streets, a cycle rally for the hard-core orwhat the hell – let’s just get people, lots of people together. Otherwise its pathetic, isn’t it?”, emailed yet another.
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Asks a foreigner,”Where is the dissent in this country!?”

Posted by Ujwal Thapa Filed in Government, Idea, entrepreneurship, environment, food for thought, inspiration, leadership, philosophy, tips No Comments »

A better use of the old Royal Palace in Kathmandu.

December 13th, 2009

Want some creative use of the old Royal Palace! It is a huge space in the most lucrative business districts of the country and it now houses a stupid museum and a stupid bureaucratic hole. So lets suggest some creative ideas for this space. Here are some of mine:

  • Take the bloody foreign ministry somewhere else first.
  • Get a bid for building a hybrid limited storied business- commercial shopping complex all around the Palace. This way new businesses will have a new address to attract nepalis and foreigners alike. Cap the design to be more architecturally Kathmandu’s Malla period architecture. Let there be a open plan/competition for architects for a design that incorporates tourism complex with a big park in the middle.  Use this to attract responsible tourism related business into the complex. (plan is to extend and upgrade Thamel’s charm there in a more cultural plus natural framework).
  • Let most of the revenue go towards building an impecabbly well maintained park not unlike the “Garden of Dreams” next door in Thamel. This will be our ‘Central Park of New York.’ Build a park where people can walk, children can play and pets can be brought in safely. Ban Big gatherings. They can go do that out in the streets of Kathmandu where they belong.
  • Also make it a space for morning/evening walks, outdoor running, and peaceful meditation spots.
  • Make another small space  within this,where Artists, musicians, dancers, creative teams (not political) can hold open gatherings (without too much disturbances – architects can design this within the huge space of the Former Royal Palace.
  • Make the park vehicle free but build a underground parking area though that will generate additional revenue and people can park their vehicles in peace.
  • A Question: Make it open but with strict enforcement to keep out the law breakers around ? ” or keep it closed and with an affordable fee -easier to manage? catch-22?

Add your own ideas in the comments below at whynepal.com

.

Posted by Ujwal Thapa Filed in Government, Links, entrepreneurship, environment No Comments »

you force-close a city

June 1st, 2009

So you force-close a city (Kathmandu) for a day:

  • you put brakes on 5 million people’s mind for a day
  • you make 5 million idle minds become a devil’s playground
  • you force a million youths to lose their morale and purpose (one level down at  a time).
  • you strangle any entrepreneur’s budding desires to start something here.
  • you make me question your moral superiority and …doubt mine (for bowing to you)
  • you make me not want to do anything for anyone.
  • you make us all dumber
  • you force 5 million people to be poorer.
  • you make it easier for us to leave and leave you all alone.

what a Lose- Lose situation.

Posted by Ujwal Thapa Filed in Government, Nepal's economy, food for thought No Comments »

A manifesto for a youth movement to revolutionize Nepal through “common sense”.

April 30th, 2009

Here is my call for a youth movement to revolutionize Nepal through “common sense”.
Nepali Youth leaders with charisma, passion, leadership and vision and entrepreneurial in spirit, come together to set up a new youth movement. Young leaders (hopefully “youths”) from walks of life, from major parties, students, passionate intellectuals, doctors, engineers, scientists, and radicals, young entrepreneurs and economists rush to join this new movement based on the philosophy of “common sense“. We are tired of the antics in Nepal’s leadership (all of them). All we ever wanted was a leadership to lead us with “common sense”. We haven’t found this in the current leadership or the elder generation as a whole. Therefore We will be the new “common sense” leaders.
This team would be able to set a new path and direction for the whole country through a series of policies based on “common sense”. Grand principles of the past are illusions which needs to be dismantled to address the unique scenario of Nepal with its hundreds of tribes, thousands of problems, lakhs of independent spirited youths and tens of millions of hungry people for change.

I say, how best to achieve this other than through a a leadership that works passionately with “common sense”, youth motivation and high emotional intelligence.

Here is the Basic Rights we believe in:

Prosperity: is a basic human requirement that fulfills a lot of other human rights. A prosperous woman is a woman with dignity and resources to keep her family out of poverty. A prosperous woman demands and gets her rights without abusing or trampling on another. A prosperous woman has the resources to educate her family to moral beings. And we are a movement that will get her this way of life for her. We encourage prosperity by mobilizing social entrepreneurs on the forefront of this fight.
Equality: “We celebrate diversity as long as it does not trample on our other basic human rights to food, education and love.” Federalism or other concepts of politics should be based on this common sense. “It is my right to live free, hunger free and in peace in my country.”  Disruptive tactics to peaceful negotiation for one’s rights are a violation of one’s rights to prosperity just as much as denial of work to a Dalit based on prejudices is a violation of one’s right to prosperity. The new youth movement of Nepal will make sure that youths are the rulers of Nepal where they are the primary stakeholders and the gateway to the future generation’s peace and tranquility. Enough of the elder generation who calculate their contribution by the days they spent in prison. Our responsibility begins, not ends. When we gain power, our governance model is making communities prosperous by the method of “self-sustainability and self-reliance.”
Our governance: This movement believes the central government’s primary role is only to be a vanguard of maintaining peace, law and order in the country. It will leave the nation building process to special teams of bright young team of individuals called “social entrepreneurs” who work directly with local communities to work towards creating a prosperous Nepal. It will be the guardian of Nepali people so that no greater injustice is done while we are on the nation building process. It will leave the nation building process to “social entrepreneurs” while making sure it remains the watchdog so that given rights and special powers to the “social entrepreneurs” are not abused. A government is a facilitator when it comes to handling the economy. It is no better than private institutions when it comes to providing services like health, education and food. It cannot and will not work alone to provide this. It will work with young, independent teams of bright young strategists to help bring these basic human rights of people in an efficient and sustainable manner. it will take some time to accomplish this but it will remain steadfast in fulfilling these rights before concentrating on other human rights.

We believe that simply depending on the central government for your basic rights is evil and backwards. This kind of thoughts make the government the ruler of Nepalis rather than be a guardian. Our strategy is to make each village, town self sustainable and able to rule itself wisely. A model of self governance at micro level is a social experiment we will push for and crave for. We don’t want you to rely on us. We want you to rely on yourself. We will be your aid in your quest for self reliance.

Accountability: Our leadership is directly accountable to our practical goals and the amount of rewards and punishments a leader takes is directly proportional to the higher degree of responsibilities we take. Culture of accountability will erase the culture of impunity. This movement understands the transparent and globalised world we live in. We are fusing every part of decision making with the youths in focus right down to the high school. We are open sourcing our government. We are open sourcing our ideals, our goals and our strategies so that you can advice us while we fine tune our universal health care or our universal practical education system.Foreign policy: Nepal’s relationship the rest of the world is based on equality and brotherly love.  We will follow policies of deep respect to the two neighbors and we will tie our economies closely, openly and ’strongly’ with both our neighbors. This will be the basis on all agreements. This ensures political games remain secondary to the economic brotherhood that we will cultivate. A healthy and mutually beneficial economy will deter any haphazard political games to be played by our neighbors. Nepal is a “neutral” on all affairs associated with China and India. Its relationship with China and India supersedes all other relationships in the world.
Evolution: As times change, and with it, we shall evolve. We believe in the evolution of our basic principles of “common sense”. As times change, we will evolve and even mutate. If we stick to principles which have stopped making sense, we become obsolete. The world is changing fast. Look where we have reached in 100 years, from primitive non flying humans to evolved man who can communicate thousand of miles away instantly. Basing our primary interest in making each Nepali family rich, prosperous and independent while being able to live in peace, we will evolve to absorb any principles that work in this goal. The goal is to have your family live in prosperity and peace. You decide the moral,ethical, religious rule inside your house. We have no right over your private morals, thinking and ideologies and we will not dictate our ideals upon your “private” lives.
Summary: We will work to make our own jobs obsolete. i.e make you self-sustaining. This will be enshrined as one of the founding principles of our ideologies. We celebrate Diversity is a gift, we want to use it wisely, but diversity at the cost of unity is a dead end, an uncontrollable chaos, a deep abyss. And we will stop this at any cost. Until most of Nepalis have a sound education and are covered by a universal health policy, the central government will take an active role in creating this health and education system with partnership with local bodies and social entrepreneurs but after this has been reasonably achieved, this too will be handed over solely to the realms of local social entrepreneurs and local governments. In the end, the central government is a lean body which maintains the rule of law and integrity in Nepal.
Hope you enjoyed reading!
warmth,
Ujw
(This document is a work in progress and i welcome any addition to improve it, challenge it or trash it).
Posted by Ujwal Thapa Filed in Government, change, food for thought, social entrepreneurs 1 Comment »

current state of things.

December 21st, 2008

When people who have the ability to create work, are afraid to invest time and effort in it,
when people who have wealth, want to hide it,
when people who have ideas, want to keep it to themselves out of fear or lack of enthusiasm or passion,
when people who want to improve but can’t because they can only improve at the cost of taking some one else’s territory (or rights, or wealth or space)

then that is the time, when you know all hell is about to break loose….

Prediction : Nepal: soon ???

Folks, it just might be a good time to stay away… (for now)..

Posted by Ujwal Thapa Filed in Government, change, food for thought, leadership No Comments »
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