Today's Chatpat: October 16th, 2023

1. Prime Minister Prachanda has stated that if anti-democratic forces continue to create problems in the country, then he will bring all his fans to the streets to fight those against the blatant looting of state treasury by those in power. Sometimes, we too are confused when it comes to figuring out who are the enemies of the state?

Is it us, the common people who have to pay taxes on everything from daily essentials to fuel to even for foreign visits for recreation or education who are anti-national or is it our civil servants, contractors, cadres and the clowns who run the country and have take the country down the drain in the past fifteen years of becoming a Republic? 

2. Nepal Police has begun taking action against offline-riders working for Pathao and also inDrive. Pathao is a registered company, paying taxes and providing insurance for riders and passengers while inDrive is not even registered in Nepal and pays no taxes and is basically an illegal enterprise.

But it seems that people behind inDrive are paying somebody off and violating all regulations required for offering such services. The government has not taken any action against inDrive or shut down its app in the country despite numerous reports of violation and safety issues of InDrive for years. Nepal Police has advised all passengers to use the ride services through app booking and not use offline-rides for their own safety reasons.

3. According to the 2023 Global Hunger Index, Nepal seems to be doing better than its peers in the South Asian region. But, the reality is that majority of the population is a little less hungry than our counterparts in the SAARC region due to the US$10 billion remittance we receive each year from our loved ones who are working hard in foreign lands.

Nepal is ranked 69th out of 125 countries reviewed, and we are at the 'moderate level of hunger' as per the Western-funded annual report. Food prices increase every year and even though the government tells us that our inflation rate is around 7%, we seem to pay 20% more for everything every year and we still are okay with the corruption and over-taxation by our government.

4. Afghanistan is experiencing repeat earthquakes, totaling three majors ones within a week. Thousands of people have lost their lives but the Israel-Palestine conflict seems to be the major talking point in the global scene while hundreds of thousands are suffering in Afghanistan due to the earthquakes.

Here in Nepal, earthquakes of magnitude of less than 5 have been hitting our region frequently in the past few weeks although loss of human lives have been minimal, hundreds have faced losses of their homes in the hills. A 4.8M earthquake struck yesterday with Darchula being the epicenter.

5. Although most government offices close for around six days during Dashain, our courts seem to follow the school calendar where most students get a two-week break for Dashain. Most of our judges at the district, High and Supreme Court will be on vacation and the courts will be closed except for habeas corpus hearings.

According to government data, our courts have more than 38,000 cases pending and in the past year, our justices only managed to give verdicts on 20% of those cases, leaving 30,000 cases still pending at our courts. More than 4,000 cases have been pending since five years and our judges are more likely to postpone the hearings than work to resolve the cases swiftly.