By Madan Lamsal

Everyone in Nepal is equally concerned about and committed to the development of this “rich-mines, poor-minds” country. But, what puzzles everyone is the fact that Nepal has, so far, truly lagged far behind in development despite so much effort and foreign aid.

But not anymore will we have these qualms since the riddle of this big WHY has now been solved. Nepal can now embark on a development track with rocket speed, absolutely different from the frog jump pattern proposed by former PM Dr Baburam Yami Bhattarai.

We had had such difficulty in developing the country mainly because the lost key of development lied elsewhere - somewhere outside the country. Thank God! This mystery has been resolved now after the appointment of Lokman Karki as the CIAA chief. Every Nepali by now understands that the key to our development lies in the hands of foreign countries, maybe our neighbours or the superpowers. Or, possibly, there could be many keys with many ‘partners’ that we got to find out and bring them back.

It is this realisation that is pushing every Nepali regardless of age, gender, origin, religion or profession to foreign lands. Recently, Nepal’s quintessential leader Comrade Prachanda visited both our northern and southern neighbours in quick succession, last month. He not only talked about Nepal’s development, but also proposed a new vision of ‘triangular model’ involving China, India and Nepal. His wisdom did highly impress the leaders of both sides, akin to his claims. The likelihood is that he might be hired as a consultant by the planners of these countries to generate such great angular visions which they could never think of so far. In the power corridors of New Delhi, he was even asked if his triangle could be made a quadrangle by adding a ‘people’s war dimension to it’ so that it could be copyrighted as the new Prachandapath model of development!

Not only Prachanda, but also his party rank and file believes that the key to Nepal’s development is indeed in the hands of foreigners. His deputy, Dr Bhattarai, in a recent trip to Australia made it clear that the people who live in Nepal are unable to develop it, so those who have left Nepal and become foreigners should develop it.

See the impact of foreign trips! These leaders who believed in putting schools on fire, bombing suspension bridges in remote hinterland, felling telephone and electricity polls and destroying public property have suddenly started talking about development. If you still don’t believe that the key to Nepal’s development lies in foreign hands, consider the following examples as well.

Not only politicians, but also most civil servants are dying to grab any possible opportunity for a foreign trip. Because they realize that their years of experience in service has failed to teach them how to develop the country and, therefore, seek the compensation for it a foreign trip.  Therefore, senior officers prefer to participate in foreign trainings, workshops or seminars where nominations are actually sought from junior positions. Simply, the more senior people who participate, the more cakes of development they would bring back.

Such love for Nepal’s development is not limited to politicians and civil servants. You can simply say that anyone very keen to go abroad is a true lover of Nepal’s development. Every Nepali student believes that s/he cannot develop this nation by studying here. That’s why visa applications are filed as soon as the completion  of +2 education. Those who fail to leave the country are even more patriotic. They do not miss even a single opportunity to protest against any anti-development move of the government. And they make sure that they destroy some amount of existing public property so that it could be replaced by a new one. 

The members of the general public who are smart enough want to leave the country at any cost. They too realize the fact that no development is possible within the country. Manpower agencies, planners and development experts, all by now agree that the country will not develop from within, so we must bring everything from other countries. Everything means everything- a constitution, directives for the government dictating who should be appointed where and what model of development should be followed. With this, one can be pretty sure of the faster development we have missed thus far.