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Today's Chatpat: October 9th, 2023

1. Transportation entrepreneurs in the country have warned that those leaving the valley for Dashain holidays will face a long, difficult ride as our highways are ill-maintained and the traffic police give a hard time to the bus wallahs by conducting unnecessary checks. Advance booking for bus tickets for Dashain has been opened since yesterday and although bus wallahs claim no price hike in place, many booking counters are charging a little extra during Dashain.

The Kathmandu-Pokhara road is riddled with construction and highways connecting Butwal, Biratnagar, Kavre and many across the country have not been repaired or have been dug up for years without any completion of the projects undertaken by the contractors.

2. 13 people have been arrested by Nepal Police this morning for protesting in front of The President's House. Yes, that's the official name of the residence of our honorable President, whose decision to pardon a local criminal from Nepalgunj who was serving time for murdering his former partner eight years ago has angered the general public.

The local gunda is affiliated with the Nepali Congress and he has now gone on TV giving an interview with Rishi Dhamala. The pardoned murderer is seen trying to justify his freedom on national TV by blurting out names of many politically-affiliated mundreys and jholeys pardoned over the years by the government.

3. The Hamas-Israel battle is still going on as thousands of civilians in Gaza are now facing further hardship as electricity has been cut off and are bombarded by Israeli missiles and air strikes. Netanyahu thinks that the only answer to Hamas' surprise attack is to destroy and flatten hundreds of buildings in the Gaza area and target civilians just like Hamas did.

4. It seems that our chiefs of Nepal Police and the Nepal Army will be in the UK to participate in their respecting meetings. And our Finance Minister is going to Morrocco to attend the annual meet of the World Bank. Ours is probably the only country where heads of government agencies, ministers and even the PM do not for a second think about declining such invitations where lower-rung officials can attend and get some experiences instead.

Our higher-up visit foreign destinations as if they have to show their stamped diplomatic passports to their grand kids someday and hope they will also mention that it was all free at the expense of our taxpayers as well. The PM alone has visited India, Italy, US and China in the past three months .

5. Our CIB (Central Investigation Bureau) is done with investigating the 9kg gold scam. It has now recommended prosecution of four individuals, including Rahul Mahara, son of former Speaker Krishna Bahadur Mahara. The 9kg gold was found to be concealed in e-cigarettes (vapes) in December last year.

It seems that the Senior Mahara is getting a pass since he has already been embroiled in one too many controversies over the years. His political standing has diminished inside his own Maoist party, where he was once seen as the number two. His conversation with a Chinese businessman asking for Rs 50 crore to buy MPs was released many years ago and nothing came out of it. He spent some time in jail for sexually assaulting a government employee but was given a clean chit while the victim was labeled mentally disturbed.

The media has published many audio, pictures and videos linking many high-rung leaders of the Maoist party with Chinese and other foreign gold smugglers but so far, not even one of them have been charged and the CIB seems to be in a lot of pressure not to target politicians while their kids might be fair game for now!

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