Free market prescriptions:

Apropos of article “Landlocked opportunities” published in THT on February 19, Rakesh

Wadhwa should be thanked for bringing out optimistic points of view on Nepal being positioned between two vast nations. His idea of how a landlocked country can benefit economically from its geographical location is a good one. However, his idea of making Nepal a duty-free state would only provide a temporary solution to the economic problems facing this war-torn country. If Nepal were to become a duty-free state, there would be multiplier effects on the economy. A duty-free country would have to increasingly rely on greater import of finished goods with additional value added in the manufacturing countries. Economic liberalisation is good, but it should be practised with caution as in India and China. While advocating free market policies, it is equally important to protect domestic industries.

Nayan Joshi, via e-mail

CIAA’s turn:

Most people have blamed the political leaders for their twelve years of ineffectual governance. Some of them who had been charged by the RCCC under corruption charges seem happy after the disbandment of the commission. However, the Supreme Court’s decision does not prove their innocence. The CIAA, which is a constitutionally formed body, should now resume its task and start investigation into corruption cases and bring the guilty to book. If the law duly punishes the corrupt, it would help the political parties to regain some of the lost respect and credibility from the general public.

Ramesh B Shrestha, Lalitpur

Inspiration:

We must appreciate the efforts of some business organisations towards development of football in Nepal. Their sponsorships provide motivation to the players. Such lucrative offers should be provided to other sportsmen, too. The state has still to do a lot for the development of sports in Nepal. Most of the clubs that play the prestigious Martyrs Memorial League every year are based in Kathmandu. There is thus an immediate need to focus on the development of sports at the regional level as well.

Karuna Phuyal, St Xavier’s College

Follow rules:

Traffic rules must be followed by everyone whether pedestrians or drivers. But the traffic police in the Valley seems to concentrate only on regulating the vehicles. Though we have to

appreciate the traffic police’s efforts to regulate the traffic, they must also pay attention to the irresponsible pedestrians and cyclists, who cross roads from anywhere they wish. A lot of accidents could be prevented if the traffic police imposed severe penalties on those pedestrians and cyclists breaking the rules.

Jeetendra Vaidya, via e-mail

Fix links:

Thanks for providing news and articles on the PDF files. Some links in THT websites are still not working properly. It would be nice if you could fix this problem and provide one more option to download all the pages at once.

Prakash Pradhan, via e-mail