Tuesday, April 27, 2010

[NNSD] RE: Newa Rajya

April 26, 2010

Mr Ram Babu Nepal

Dear Ram Babujee

Thanks a lot for joining in the debate/discourse.

One thing seems clear: the proponents of restructuring of Nepal on ethno-cultural-religious-linguist groups think about their own ethno-cultural-religious-linguist group only and not worry about what will happen after fragmenting Nepal on those lines. There are already disputes as to where should the boundaries of each of these ethno-cultural-religious-linguist provinces lie. Newa Rajya itself is a good example. UCPNM has declared only Kathmandu valley as Newa Rajya while there are others who include more than 10 districts surrounding this valley. It will not be simple to settle such disputes. We will have further disputes when the ethno-cultural-religious-linguist groups that have not been recognized for the purposes of state restructuring demand states of their own; triggering creation of over 90 new ethno-cultural-religious-linguist states. At that point in time the ethno-cultural-religious-linguist groups that are being proposed to be recognized now will have no moral right to deny the same treatment to other ethno-cultural-religious-linguist groups. This will become a never ending process. Potential disputes also lie in locating capital of each of these ethno-cultural-religious-linguist states. We have seen disputes as to where should a new university be located or a new stadium should be built. State capital will be deemed of higher importance than a university and/or stadium and such disputes will be of higher magnitude. This tiny country will not be able to withstand all of these disputes and things could snowball out of control and may start unravel. Instead we should concentrate our efforts to take this country to higher plane of economic development rather than doing things such that this country will get entangled in the disputes that we can ill-afford from the perspective of time, energy and resources.

I have compiled following table to understand how tiny Nepal is and how tinier each of potential states with right to self determination will be.
If we are to accept proposed restructuring average area per state will be 10, 513 sq km only and with further division to accommodate aspiration of remaining ethno-cultural-religious-linguist groups, the average area per state will be 1,732 sq km only. One also needs to internalize this from the perspective of average population in each state. Russia and China are justified to have that many states even from the perspective of time zones. Same is the case of both India and China although they have only one time zone.

We also need to understand economic ramification of this centrifugal tendency. This year’s budget for the upkeep of one set of president and vice president, cabinet, parliament, judiciary, various constitutional bodies, etc. is around Rs 1 billion. There are indications that the actual expenditure will be a lot more than that. Therefore, if one is to assume that it will cost about Rs 500 million (Rs 50 crore) for each state for the upkeep of a governor, state cabinet, parliament, judiciary, various constitutional bodies, etc. the total additional outlay each year will be Rs 7 billion. What makes me worried is how can Nepal afford this additional outlay when we don’t seem to be able to afford to provide clean drinking water to ensure that people don’t die of cholera (quite a few have already met the unfortunate fate this year too in west Nepal) or some food to save them from famine.

Therefore, in my considered opinion this isn’t a path for us to follow.

With best regards,

Sincerely,

Ratna Sansar Shrestha

From: NNSD@yahoogroups.com [mailto:NNSD@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of Ram Babu Nepal
Sent: Friday, April 23, 2010 21:00
To: NNSD@yahoogroups.com
Subject: **SPAM** Re: [NNSD] RE: Newa Rajya


My sincere appreciation for your continued write-ups on the issues that affects all of us. In my opinion, the proponents of ethnic states are either knowingly or unknowingly pursuing the path of hatred among Nepali and different ethnic groups which is very much detrimental and unsustainable.. What can we gain by making ethnic states except limited glorification to a few. Are all people going to benefit from this confined provincial (state) system? It is very opportune time to strengthen Nepal instead of instigating division among us who lived harmoniously for centuries. There are ways to enhance backward and underprivildged people without looking them from ethnic division. In different parts of country, all ethnic groups even Bahun and Kshetri are in destitute condition. The role of state and leaders is to improve their living condition than dividing people on ethnic ground.

With best wishes,

Ram Babu Nepal

On Sun, Apr 18, 2010 at 2:30 AM, Ratna Sansar Shrestha <rsansar@mos.com.np> wrote:

Dear Proponent of Newa Rajya

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