Madhesi Front Threatened to Obstruct the Budget

A delegation of Democratic Madhesi Front handed over memorandum of understanding to minister of finance Bharat Mohan Adhikary threatening to obstruct the budget for the new fiscal (2011/12) if the finance minister did not include its demands.

“We will compel to obstruct the budget if Ministry did not respond to our demand,” said J.P Ananda Gupta, a leader of Front. The government is trying to ignore the agenda raised by the members of Madheshi party. We will not let fiancé ministry to read the budget without credible evidence,” said Gupta, chairman, Madhesi Janaadhikar Forum (Republic).

The government is scheduled to table the budget on June 14. The Democratic Madhesi Front, which has strength of 70 members in the Constituent Assembly (CA), condemned the government policy and program for ignoring “The policy document is influenced by hill-centric thought and totally ignores and discriminates against the Madhes. The front condemns the anti-Madhes policy approved on the basis of blind majority,” said Gupta.

http://www.spotlightnepal.com/News.aspx?ArticleID=1280

Nepalese PM committed to five point agreement

Prime Minister Jhalnath Khanal said that he is working to implement the five point agreement signed by three major political parties in May 28 before extension of five point agreement. “I am seriously working to implement the five point agreement so that the constitution writing process and peace process complete in logical end,” said Prime Minister Khanal.

His statement came when Nepali Congress leaders are criticizing him for not showing any sincerity to abide five point agreements. One of the clauses of the five point agreement is the resignation of prime minister on the basis of consensus

http://www.spotlightnepal.com/News.aspx?ArticleID=1267

Maternal mortality rate down by half in South Asia: UN

Eleven years after adopting millennium development goals (MDG), the UN has observed a reduction in maternal mortality rate by over 50 percent in South Asia, a report said here Friday.The MDG, adopted by world leaders in the year 2000, are a set of targets to reduce global poverty and improve living standards by 2015.

"Between 1990 and 2008, maternal mortality declined by 53 percent in South Asia, including Bangladesh, India, Sri Lanka, Pakistan, Bhutan, Nepal, and Afghanistan among others," the report said. But it added the South Asian region still "lags in nutrition, sanitation, and gender equality".

The ratios of girl education were also startling: "74 girls were enrolled in tertiary education as compared to 100 boys for South Asia."

WORLD DEVELOPMENT REPORT 2011 Nepali Anti-trafficking Hero Honored in Washington

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton, left, hugs Charimaya Tamang of Nepal, a trafficking survivor herself, as she is awarded the 2011 Hero Acting to End Modern-Day Slavery Award, Monday, June 27, 2011, during the release of the 2011 Trafficking in Persons (TIP) Report, at the State Department in Washington. Shortly before her departure for the U.S., Ambassador DeLisi welcomed Ms. Tamang to the Embassy in Kathmandu to congratulate her and wish her safe travels.

The 2011 TIP Report notes: “Born into a poor family made poorer by the passing of her father, Charimaya Tamang was 16 when she was trafficked to India. She spent 22 months enslaved in a brothel before the Indian government rescued her and more than 200 other Nepali women in 1996. Upon her return to Nepal, Ms. Tamang faced social stigma and was outcast from her own community. But she courageously filed a case against her traffickers, becoming the first person to file personally a trafficking case with the district police. In 1997, the District Court – in a landmark decision – convicted and sentenced eight offenders involved in her case.

http://www.spotlightnepal.com/Abroad.aspx

Pang of Protest

Nepal's industrial sector has been facing worse scnario in the last one decades. Even after the years of negotiations, there is no sign for returning of normalcy. Protest and lock up are the modality.
http://spotlightnepal.com/sln/National.aspx?ArticleID=1005

New Spotlightnepal

New Spotlightnepal

Nepal's Debate: Federalization would only wreak havoc by Bihari Krishna Shrestha.

While the relative deprivation of non-caste Tibeto-Burman ethnic groups, now generically known as janajati groups, vis-à-vis the Hindu high caste groups, mainly Brahmins and Chhetris, is increasingly being used as a political agenda at the hands of the “ethnic” leaders, it has since been adopted as such by various political parties too particularly after Jana Andolan II of 2006. Ethnicity as the basis for federalization of the country along with the provision of so-called “preferential rights” for specific Tibeto-Burman ethnic groups has now become the ever too intractable subject of political debate in the Constituent Assembly and outside with no unity of view in sight even as the latter’s extended tenure is drawing to a close. Those in favour generally maintain that ethnic groups, both the janajati and Madhesi, have long been disadvantaged due to Hill Bahun Chhetri political, social and economic hegemony even as the Janajati people in particular have been the ones indigenous to Nepal with many regions in Nepal historically named after them such as Magrat where Magars live. They argue that a time-bound provision of preferential rights is necessary to enable them to come at par with the Bahun Chhetri combine. Those against retort that given the immense ethnic diversity (100 plus caste ethnic groups) and ethnically mixed communities countrywide, ethnicity-based division of the country would be chaotic and would result in inter-ethnic animosities, including its possible disintegration. It is further argued that deprivation is not limited to ethnic groups alone. While it is quite widespread among Bahun and Chhetri too, the dalits are by far the most deprived, although no specific region can be allocated to the latter due to their countrywide geographical spread that also deprives them of the power that otherwise comes with numbers. Besides, Hindu caste groups, generically being referred to as Khas more recently, predominate numerically in western regions, but the proposal does not name any province after them, thus suggesting that the exercise is inherently biased against caste Hindus. http://spotlightnepal.com/sln/Others.aspx?ArticleID=1003&IssueID=21

Politics

Politics CONSTITUENT ASSEMBLY Constitutional Conundrum As May 28 draws closer, concerns over whether the new constitution will be promulgated by that deadline are naturally growing. The activities going on inside and outside the Constituent Assembly indicate that the new constitution, even if it is promulgated, will not give a long term solution to the long running political instability. Nepal’s hard geostrategic realities are its two giant neighbours. Within home, the many voices of differences and dissents coming from a range of political and ethnic organisations compound the problems. Disagreements pervade from the top to the bottom of the constitution making process. Even at the best scenario at the moment, the new constitution looks likely to face a similar fate as the six constitutions that Nepal experimented with before: http://spotlightnepal.com/sln/Politics.aspx?ArticleID=883