Good idea gone bad

The World Food Program (WFP) should congratulate itself that its cooking oil distribution scheme has succeeded in assuring girl children’s continued school attendance in Baitadi,

“Bathwater, not baby” (THT, May 1). If the girls purposely flunk at Class V to continue to get the benefit, why cannot the programme be extended to girls moving on to higher grades?

Furthermore, if it is combined with a provision to reduce or discontinue the benefit to those who fail, it would even encourage parents to bear on their girl children to do better in school. Hence there is room for WFP to do much more.

Bihari Krishna Shrestha, Green Block, Patan

Work it out

Apropos of the news report “JEMC was too busy to print textbooks” (THT, May 1), it is irresponsible of the authorities concerned not to get the textbooks ready on time. As for the change in syllabuses of grades III, IX and X, it does take a lot of time to change them. But what about the plight of the students? It is very difficult to study without textbooks and even if it arrives after a month as planned, that would be too late. All the factors affecting this case, like load-shedding, availability of petro-products, printing papers etc. must be addressed.

Rhea Gurung,

St. Mary’s High School

Bad idea

How will you react if someone comes calling to check on your children? Will you feel comfortable about letting someone encroach on the space between you and your children? This is probably how the parents who have adopted children feel if some authorities

approached them inquiring about their kids. When I read the news report about six government teams headed for seven European countries and the United States to monitor the

situation of the internationally adopted children, “Government to monitor status of children adopted by foreigners” (THT, April 30), the first question that came to my mind was what if the situation of the adopted children was not found satisfactory? At a time when budget deficit is growing by the day, the Ministry of Women, Children and Social Welfare is planning visits of at least 20 of its members for a minimum of 10 days when no satisfactory outcome can be expected from the visits.

Monitoring the situation of adopted children is a noble task but not at the expense of taxpayers’ hard-earned money. In the present situation when the country is struggling to build its basic infrastructure, visiting foreign countries for a cause like this really needs to be rethought. I have not understood some important aspects of the itineraries and I suppose the same is the case with many others. May I exercise my right to information in asking the government to justify the visits and their results?

Sanjeev Dahal,

St. Xavier’s College

Possible

One of the recent news items concerns the commitment of Maoists to produce 10,000 MW of hydroelectricity in 10 years. The task is feasible with proper utilisation of water resources. Like Upper Tamakoshi, hydropower projects funded by national actors should be

encouraged. This will be possible through government investment and utilisation of unused capital.

Aakash Parajuli,

Kapan, Kathmandu