Apropos of the news story “Jungle safari operators demand regulations” (THT, January 28, Page 5), if it is true, as bragged, that one tourist creates 13 jobs, one million tourists should have employed 13 million people in the country in 2017.

This is bit far-fetched. Also the contention that “elephants are not only earning money for the tourism business, they are also earning for themselves” smacks of pure buffoonery. What does it mean that elephants are earning for themselves? Thank God, elephants have not asked for bonus, pay hike, better living conditions, nutritious ration, or sought control of the lodges and its people as the pigs did in George Orwell’s epic Animal Farm. Rather than hanging on to their anachronistic and solipsistic thinking that absence of elephant safaris will take a toll on wildlife tourism, the operators in Chitwan must reinvent their wildlife packages focusing on not only traditional touristic activities but also on environmental education and stimulating talks on aspects such as growing human-wildlife conflicts, which could be matter of great interest to discerning visitors.

They need to add more values than stick dance, elephant rides and rowing on the Rapti, Reu and Narayani rivers.

To say that ban on elephant rides will jeopardise billions of rupees investment in hotels is akin to Napoleon and Snowball telling other pigs in the Animal Farm that they will lose out on the gains of revolution if they are not kept in power. Nothing could be more ludicrous than this.

Manohar Shrestha, Kathmandu

Take action

This is with reference to the news story “Employee absenteeism rampant” (THT, February 6, Page 2). It is frustrating to know that the National Vigilance Centre (NVC) found that a significant number of civil servants were absent during the office hours in Kathmandu and Bhaktapur.

The NVC had made a surprise visits to various government offices last week. During its inspection, the NVC found 107 government employees — 77 employees Kathmandu and 30 in Bhaktapur — were out of their respective offices. Some of them were also found to have flouted the dress code, which is mandatory during the office hours.

The NVC had also made surprise inspections in six districts outside the Valley about one month ago and, found a large number of employees not present in their offices. The NVC has recommended departmental actions against those who remained absent during the duty time. It has become a culture among the government employees to bunk the offices. It is the service seekers who suffer a lot when the government employees are not present in their offices.

As the elected officials have taken charge at the local and provincial levels, they should regularly monitor all the government offices to make sure that the employees are on their seats providing services to the people.

Sunita Maharjan, Kirtipur