Name any prime minister or minister, past or present, they all began their career as student leaders
More than 30 years after multi-party democracy was ushered into the country, academic programmes at Nepal's first and largest university, Tribhuvan University (TU), continue to play second fiddle to student politics. Despite the vast grounds and buildings, comparable to any other university abroad, it has, the academic environment is utterly missing, where student unions affiliated to the different political parties hold sway over the running of the university, using threats, including to cause physical harm. At a press meet on Sunday, the Vice Chancellor of TU, Dharmakanta Baskota, lamented that the agitating students were becoming rowdy. He had received a message on the mobile phone from the leader of the Nepal Students Union, a sister organisation of the ruling Nepali Congress party, to stay away from the university as the peaceful agitation of the students was turning violent, and they would not be responsible for any untoward incident. The president of the students union said they were forced to agitate as the TU officials were unsympathetic to their demands.
Among the demands of the union include taking action against the teachers for the negligence shown in repeating the questions of last year for the Master's level exam, and making public the report of the committee constituted to look into the irregularities and the persons involved. According to the exam controller, action has been taken against the negligent teachers and making public the names would amount to putting their life in danger, as two wrong-doers in the past had been killed while making public their names. Putting forward these demands, the union has padlocked the offices of the vice-chancellor, registrar and two deans. In short, the union wants them to step down, as they were appointed by the KP Oli government of the now opposition UML, to make way for someone from the ruling parties.
It is most unfortunate that student politics should disturb the academic environment of the university. Appointments are made for a period of four years, but when there is a change of government, it becomes very hard for them to continue functioning.
So when the top level officials are constantly being threatened, how do you expect the academic environment to improve in them? Student politics is the easiest way to making a foray into the corridors of power. Name any prime minister or minister, past or present, they all began their career as student leaders, shutting down colleges and engaging in other nefarious activities instead of studying. How long this is to continue is anyone's guess, as tens of thousands of students are forced to go abroad for higher education when they could have had it for a fraction of the cost. It is indeed pitiable that the parties should be using TU and other colleges to serve their parochial interests when governments around the world spend heavily to recruit the best of teachers and create the best academic environment to produce the best human resource. The government in power has the onus to bring the stalemate at TU to an end. The home minister cannot be evading its responsibility of providing security to the TU officials when their lives are being threatened.
Autumn climbing
The Department of Tourism (DoT) has begun issuing expedition permits for the upcoming autumn season that starts shortly after the monsoon. So far, the DoT has issued permits to three expedition teams comprising 15 foreign mountaineers to scale three mountains, including Mt Manaslu (8,163 m), during the autumn season. Although weather is more favourable during autumn, less number of climbers seek permits for climbing Nepal's mountains during autumn as compared to the spring season.
Most of the foreign climbers want to climb Mt Manaslu and Ama Dablam during autumn.
Mountaineering is one of the major sources of foreign currency earnings. Tourism activities in Nepal have returned to normalcy after two years of the COVID-19 pandemic. Spring expeditions went well despite the ongoing war between Russia and Ukraine. The DoT has expected more than 100 climbers during the autumn season. The autumn season can be made as popular as the spring season for mountaineering and trekking provided the government and the private sector come up with attractive packages for the foreigners. They must be able to add new features, such as golfing and skiing along with usual mountaineering and trekking.
A version of this article appears in the print on August 30, 2022 of The Himalayan Times.
