Is this because I’m a bad writer, you ask. Perhaps.
But more accurately, it’s because, according to a recent World Bank report, published earlier this year, Nepal is South Asia’s third poorest country with 33.9 per cent of the population living under the extreme poverty line of US$1.25 per day.[break]
To the 34% of us, reading some write-up by a writer keen on selling the tangible and intangible services that promotes New Year isn’t of interest. To the 34% of us, flipping through page after page of adverts surrounding the high-end parties at lavish luxury hotels in town is not of concern. To the 34% of us, buying a new dress for the New Year is irrelevant; we already did that for Dashain, that too with our hard-earned income.
The reality of the matter is that we rank 157 in the Human Development Index (HDI) out of 187 countries for Nepal’s HDI is 0.458 and we’re classified as a developing (that too in the lowest bracket) country. Our country sustains itself on remittances and aid money. But perhaps like Peter Bauer, the LSE and Cambridge economist stated, development aid is when money from the poor people of rich countries goes into the hands of rich people of poor countries.
Otherwise, how do we afford to spend thousands of rupees just for a certain number of hours at opulent establishments, flaunting newly bought dresses and jewels? How do we afford to pay an insurmountable sum that more often than not fails to buy us good food, if any food at all?
It’s moments like this that makes me forget that Nepal isn’t the 66% of us who read, or are capable of reading what I write, but Nepal is the 34% of us who perhaps don’t even care what I write about.
It’s this large chuck that we need to account for. After all, what use is it if the 66% of us rejoice at welcoming 2013 and celebrate the fact that the world didn’t end and we didn’t die in the past year, when out of the 34%, the world ended for some majority of them every second all because they couldn’t keep themselves warm in this brutal cold?
For the Nepalis living under the extreme poverty line of US$1.25 per day, for the Nepali living in a rented flat, for the Nepali who commutes using a tempo or microbus, for the Nepali who, with difficulty, takes out fifty rupees for a meal, for that 34% of us, what use is this commercialized New Year?
SWORUP NHASIJU
While the 66% rejoices in New Year’s Eve celebrations, the 34% stays in unlit homes without a care for the fact that 2013 will only be hours away. For this 34%, the way forward doesn’t lie in reading what I write about and expressing their own opinions on it nor does it lie in celebrating New Years. For the 34%, the way forward lies in being provided with electricity, water, subsidized goods, and welfare facilities.
For the 34% of us, whether it’s 2012 or whether it’s 2013, the concern is a stable and secure country, a country which takes care of us; the concern isn’t so much about celebrating and welcoming a New Year, as it’s about the new year being welcoming to this 34% and giving us an opportunity to celebrate.
Yes, New Years do call for celebrations, and the last thing I want to do is dampen the New Year spirit. But for the majority of the country, for the majority of us Nepalis, the reason to celebrate lies elsewhere – it lies in being a part of a country that gives us reasons to celebrate.
The writer is student of Political Science at Thammasat University.
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