At least five passengers were killed and 17 others injured when an overcrowded microbus met with an accident on Bhimdutta Highway in Chisapani Kasanichour of far-western Kailali district Sunday afternoon.
The Se-1-Ja 175 microbus en route to Dadeldhura from Attariya, Kailali, skidded off the road and plunged into a gorge at around 2:00 pm, reports said.
Four of those killed in the accident have been identified as eight-month old Anish Thapa Magar, police Assistant Sub-inspector Nar Bahadur Deuba, army man Nanda Bahadur Thapa Magar and Chandra Joshi.
Thirteen of the injured passengers have been admitted at Seti Zonal Hospital in Dhangadhi for treatment.
The Election Commission (EC) has started registering the political parties that have applied for registration to contest the November elections.
On Sunday, the EC registered 11 political parties and finalised their election symbols. Parties registered so far are Nepali Congress, CPN (UML), CPN (Maoist), Nepali Congress (Democratic), Nepal Workers and Peasants Party (NWPP), Nepal Sadbhawana Party (Anandi Devi), Rastriya Janamorcha, Rastriya Prajatantra Party (RPP), Rastriya Janashakti Party (RJP), CPN (United), CPN (Marxist, Leninist and Maoist Centre).
The CPN (Maoist), whose entry into the election politics is keenly observed by the international community, has got the communist symbol ‘hammer and sickle’ as the election symbol while two other major parties, Nepali Congress and CPN-UML, have been given their traditional symbols ‘tree’ and ‘sun’ respectively.
NC (Democratic) has been given ‘Kalash’ as its election system while the NWPP has got ‘Madal’, RPP ‘plough’, RJP ‘umbrella’, NSP-A ‘hand’, Rastriya Janamorcha ‘tea glass’ and NSP-U ‘sickle’.
Nearly 100 political parties had filed application at the EC for contesting constituent assembly polls slated for November 22.
The mission of the Asian Development Bank (ADB) has informed the government that only its board of directors can make any change in the conditions for the Melamchi Water Supply Project (MWSP), according to Kantipur daily.
At the meeting with the visiting ADB mission on Friday, the government had proposed the ADB to start the construction of tunnel as it had completed building access road. However, the mission said it can proceed only as per the project conditions – which only its board has authority to change.
According to project conditions, the government needs to hand over the management of the drinking water system of the valley to private body before the ADB can start constructing the 26-km long tunnel.
The government representatives and ADB delegation led by its deputy director general of South Asian division Sultan Hafeez Rahman are locked in dialogue since Wednesday.
The ADB headquarters had dispatched the delegation following request made by the government of Nepal to proceed with the MWSP.
Earlier, after Minister for Works and Physical Planning Hisila Yami refused to honour the previous government’s agreement to allow UK’s Severn Trent to handle the management of valley’s water distribution system, the ADB had warned it might not renew the funding commitment for the project. However, later it agreed to hold further talks with the government. ADB is the principal donor for the project.
The Interim Legislature Parliament Saturday begun discussion on the annul budget estimate presented Finance Minister Dr Ram Sharan Mahat on Thursday.
The lawmakers would debate over the budget for the next two days after which the finance minister is scheduled to answer the questions raised by the parliamentarians during the discussion.
The MPs will also have to file their amendment proposals to the finance bill at the parliament secretariat. After the response by Finance Minister, the budget will be endorsed for preliminary sanctions for the new fiscal year that begins from Tuesday.
The finance bill will be endorsed only after the parliament debates on the budget allocated to each ministry separately.
On Thursday, Dr Mahat had presented Rs 169 billion budget for the fiscal year 2007-08.
Home Minister Krishna Prasad Sitaula has asked various rebel groups active in Terai region to come to the negotiation table within the next two weeks.
Talking to reporters after the discussion at the parliamentary special committee on constituent assembly monitoring at the parliament secretariat on Saturday morning, Sitaula said if the armed groups did not come to the table within the given period, the government would dispatch the security forces against them.
He said the government was set to massively beef up security in Terai in view of the upcoming elections.
Situala named two rebellion groups, Janatantrik Terai Mukti Morcha (JTMM, led by Jaya Krishna Goit and Jwala Singh) against which the government might concentrate its action after the given time.
Earlier, during the discussion with lawmakers, the Home Minister gave assurance that government would maintain law and order in the country to hold the election in a fair and free manner.
Lawmakers had expressed concern over the fragile security situation in Terai.
At least 25 people have died and eight others are missing in landslides in the western district of Baglung.
The number of deaths in landslides in Gwalichour and Jaljala VDCs rose to 25 with two more deaths reported in fresh landslide Saturday morning. 13 people have died in Gwalichour and 12 in Jaljala, reports say.
Major landslides hit Thursday night and Friday morning in the two VDCs, killing 21 people. Over a dozen houses were swept away in the landslides that occurred after incessant rainfall the area.
At least 17 people were injured in the landslides. Those with series injuries have been brought to district headquarters Baglung Bazaar and Pokhara for treatment.
Police, Nepal Army and Young Communist League (YCL) are involved in rescue works in Gwalichour, but the rescue teams dispatched from the district headquarters had not landed in Jaljala till Saturday afternoon.
Army helicopters dropped rescuers and media persons in Gwalichour.
The Lubdi Small Hydropower Project has been swept away in the landslide.
The local administration has offered Rs 15,000 to the surviving family members of each of the dead as immediate relief aid while the injured people have been provided with Rs 4000 each.
The Red Cross and other organisations are helping the affected families with food, tents and cloths.
Construction of the Syafrubesi-Rasuwagadhi highway is set to start within the next three months with 100 percent assistance from the government of China.
The Chinese side is preparing to start the construction of the highway, which links Nepal with Tibet, by October, news reports said. Estimated to cost 1.33 billion rupees, the road, once completed, will tremendously contribute to promoting trade between Nepal and China.
Nepal and China had signed an agreement for the road project on June 25, 2007 in Lhasa. The Syafrubesi-Rasuwagadhi highway will be the second road link between Nepal and Chinese autonomous region of Tibet.
The project also includes construction of eight bridges along the highway.
Minister for Works and Physical Planning Hisila Yami has been encouraged by initial talks with the visiting delegation of Asian Development Bank (ADB) in Kathmandu.
The delegation dispatched by ADB headquarters to revive the multi-million-dollar Melamchi Water Supply Project (MWSP) held talks with government officials on Thursday.
Following the meeting, Minister Yami told reporters that the ADB was very flexible to proceed with the MWSP.
She added that the government positively considered some demands for reforms put forth by the ADB delegation.
The delegation is led by Sultan Hafeez Rahman, deputy director general of ADB’s South Asian Affairs.
The ADB headquarters had dispatched the delegation following request made by the government of Nepal to proceed with the MWSP. Earlier, after Yami refused to honour the previous government’s agreement to allow UK’s Severn Trent to handle the management of valley’s water distribution system, the ADB had warned it might not renew the funding commitment for the project. However, later it agreed to hold further talks with the government. ADB is the principal donor for the project.
The CPN-Maoist, an important constituent of the ruling coalition, has expressed its disapproval on the budget.
The former rebel party’s no.2 leader Dr Baburam Bhattarai has flayed the Nepali Congress for coming up with a pretty much same kind of budget as during its majority government, Kantipur Daily reports.
“By state restructuring, we mean to bring reforms in all sectors including economic, industrial, education and agricultural sector. However, the budget didn’t reflect that and this is why our party has serious objection towards it,” he told the daily.
Some two weeks ago Finance Minister Ram Sharan Mahat had met with Maoist chairman Prachanda and Bhattarai to take their suggestions for the budget.
“In a country like Nepal, agriculture should have been given much priority. But only cosmetic changes have been made in everything,” he said. He also criticized the government for not coming up with anything new to give respite to the conflict victims but increasing the budget for the army and police even during peacetime.
Non Resident Nepali Association (Australia) – National Coordination Committee (NCC) concluded its second Bi-National Conference at Sydney in Australia on July 7 electing a new NCC for the next two years.
The conference was intended to share the NRNA journey with all NRNs in Australia. “It was informative, humorous, provided a platform for network by linking with each other and integrated all the thoughts of moving forward the NRNs residing in Australia,” a statement by NRN Australia said.
Nepali organisations, business communities, patrons, advisors, NRN ICC members, key community leaders and Nepali intellectuals in Australia NRNA International Coordination Committee, president Dr. Upendra Mahato, NRNA vice president for East Asia D. M. Hirachan, vice president for Australia region Indra Ban, and the Charge D’affaires of Nepali Embassy Shanker D. Bairagi attended the conference.
Representative of the Minister for Immigration and Citizenship of Australia, Senator Fierravanti Wells, Federal Member of Parliament and the Shadow Minister for Multicultural Affairs, Laurie Ferguson also addressed the conference.
Several concurrent issues were discussed in relation to NRN movement enlightening the progress made so far. The expectations of the NRNs and the public were also highlighted. The discussions centered on how the NCCs could be more productive and supportive of the movement, snapshot of the proposed NRN Bill, dual citizenship issues, initiating NRN community projects in Nepal, presenting awards to most outstanding Nepali community members and the issues to be raised during the NRN ICC Third Global Conference.
The conference elected new executive committee members for the next two years under the leadership of Goba Katuwal. Dr. Ashok Shrestha and Yuba Raj Bhattarai are elected vice presidents, Dhurba Raj Subedi as National Coordinator, Bhoma Limbu as Joint National Coordinator and Ramji Bista as Treasurer along with 14 executive members.