I happened to meet one of my old friends coming from Dubai last week. Once he arrived at the Tribhuvan International Airport (TIA), he gave me a warm hug with the meaningful gesture of a new Nepal. I greeted him as usual, but he seemed strange to me as he was more curious about a new Nepal and its slogans. Not only this man, but others too who arrived into a new Nepal gave a similar gesture full of confidence. I could easily read on their faces what they meant by a new Nepal; at least they expected some new changes in the development process of the country.

Nevertheless, the country appears to be celebrating a dark year or more appropriately we can call it a year of the African Hyena deprived of hydro power in terms of its generation and supply system. The whole country is reeling under the power outages. School children are getting limited time to read and write due to

untimely power cutoff leading them towards a gloomy future deprived of education. The majority of people live in the dark in the Loktantra, but it is a heaven for a handful of people.

I am looking at my past glory and my own identity at this juncture of time when a new constitution is being framed with the deadline of May 28, 2010; I am no more interested in becoming a Rip Van Winkle, the famous character of Irving’s story. I am reminded of my past. Rip was lost, and became an unknown citizen in his own village. How can I lose my identity of a Nepali or become like the Dharabasi, who admitted not being a Nepali, and a Jhapali simply

became a Dharabasi. I am neither

interested to be regimented in a

single number nor can I be given

any new political discourse by being a Koch — Kochila from losing an identity from being a Nepali. Every Nepali has a right to be a Nepali in the new Nepal. I want to be free from any kind of political decorum.

It is time to analyze the new Nepal building process. Where have we

gone wrong? I think it is lack of will power at the political level and in

harmonizing of ideology and

practicality. It is time to unite all Nepalis for winning the crucial race. This is not the time to be preoccupied with racial differences nor an appropriate time to fight for the reservation policy in the academia. For God’s sake, let us unite for our motherland.