Nepal Votes for change

It’s been close to 20 days since I am in Nepal. As you might have already guessed, I loved this place. It’s been an absolute delight to be here. The tours, travels and visits apart, there is something very important that happened in Nepal during my stay here. Nepal has voted for a change. Nepal has voted to form its own constitution.

From what ever little I saw of Nepal, I can say that there are two major things that can drive Nepal as country (economically). One is, of course, Tourism. Another is Water power. Yes, Water power!!! A small trivia here - After Brazil, Nepal is the second country with the most water resources. You have all type of water resource here, river, like, stream - everything. I read somewhere - if somehow all this water resource is converted into energy, not a single person in Nepal will need Petrol/diesel. Everything can run on electricity.

But sadly for Nepal and its citizens, both these source of income have not been harnessed fully. For tourism to flourish fully, political stability is required. This is something that Nepal has not enjoyed for a long time. They have already been facing a lot of internal fighting and instability. Take my own case for example; in the last 20 days of my stay here, I saw five bomb blasts within a radius of 5 KMs from the place of my work and one bomb blast in a place of worship outside Katmandu valley. Even after this I see foreign tourists moving around and enjoying the place as if there are in paradise. Then just imagine, how tourism would be if there was no civil unrest and political stability in Nepal!!!

As far as harnessing water resource is concerned, it requires money. This is again something that, at present Nepal is not having in abundance. Most of the money that it has earned previously has either been either looted by anti-social elements or eaten by corrupt officials. In fact the situation is soo bad that there are only two roads of exit from Katmandu valley which is always congested. And the government does not have money to widen the road. There is only one rail line in the country. No expansion possible because the government has no money.

The common man of Nepal too seems to have become aware of these things. I think, they too now know that if situations are not changed very quickly, they will go into oblivion in the near future. Therefore Nepal has now decided for a change. Elections were held in Nepal on 10^th April, 2008. I was the witness to the campaigning phase, the election phase and also the counting phase. The enthusiasm that the general public showed was simply amazing to see. During the run up to election, at almost every corner of the place, you could see group of people discussing heatedly about the change that the country requires. Discussions about the pro’s ad Con’s of all the parties involved. During the counting phase, everybody was glued to the TV/radio/Newspaper. Everyone wanting to know the status of the pool.

The results are slowing pouring in. The Maoists seem to be heading for a landslide victory. As one of my local friend proudly said – “We will now write our own constitution”. With power now in the hands of Maoists people do feel that things might change for good. I pray that this becomes a correct prediction. I pray that peace and stability return to this small and beautiful country. Because this country deserves to be treated better :-)