Tara Air flight gone missing – found crashed in Okhaldhunga

Dec 15, 2010 @ 18:41

UPDATE: The lost aircraft of Tara Air was found crashed at Kakanidanda, Okhaldhunga. All of the 22 passengers are reported to be dead in the crash.

Tara Air owned Twin Otter plane has gone missing since the last contact with the airport tower at 3:13 pm on Wednesday 15 December, 2010. The airplane was flying from Lamidanda to Kathmandu.

It has been reported that the flight lost contact five minutes after it took off from Lamidanda airport. The Twin Otter was carrying 22 passengers that included 18 Nepalese passengers, one foreigner and three crew members on board. Captain AR Shakya was in command of the flight.

The plane is reported still missing; however, two helicopters have already been sent to Khotang for the search of the missing Twin Otter. No further details have been reported on the plane.

Tara Air offers PC-6 flights for sky diving, special photography, high altitude mountain flights and rescue operations.

CPN-UML Leaders surprised by Nepal’s proposal

Dec 21, 2010 @ 16:56

Care taker Prime Minister Madhav Kumar Nepal proposed Ram Chandra Poudel be made the next prime minister of Nepal and end the caretaker status of current government. It was a matter of concern that the country cannot afford any more delay in forming new government added Nepal.

The proposal has come as a shocker to many political parties. Maoist’s leaders took the proposal lightly but Chairman Jhala Nath Khanal objected Nepal’s proposal and stated that it was very immature of Madhav Kumar Nepal to make such proposal without even consulting with the party.

“The proposal came from the current Prime Minister when we said that the new package agreements on peace process cannot be materialized under the current caretaker government”, said Maoist Vice President Narayan Kaji Shrestha.

The price of petroleum products will be subsidized

Dec 22, 2010 @ 16:55

The government is in the preparation of subsidizing the price of various petroleum products. The decision was made after a high level task force of the Ministry for Commerce and Supplies prepared a report recommending the subsidies after two rounds of talks. The talks held between representatives of various student unions and consumer forums.
The government is planning to subsidize Rs 300 per cylinder in cooking gas and Rs 50 per month per household in kerosene. In addition, Rs 1600 per year in diesel for farmers will also be subsidized.
If approved by the Council of Ministers, the new system will cost the government an extra Rs 3.5 billion. However, the government has not agreed the proposal; subsidizing the prices in petroleum products could force to cut down various development projects.

Bungy Jump closed on dispute with the local community

Dec 23, 2010 @ 03:56

Update: The Last Resort was officially open later yesterday. The agreement between the resort and the locals is not made public. Previously posted text follows:

If the talks with the locals doesn’t go well, we might see the last of the internationally popular bungee jump in Nepal. In a press release titled “Bungy Nepal and The Last Resort forced to shut down” the owner of the New Zealand-Nepali partnership adventure sports facility, The Last Resort, has told that the locals have forced to close the bungy bridge on Poush 6, 2067. The company says that the local community has claimed the ownership of the bridge and won’t let them do the business on it. (Full press release posted at the end of the article).

The Last Resort, founded in 1999, is located in Sindupalachowk near Barabise. The 160-meter high suspension bridge was constructed on top of steep Bhote Kosi River gorge for bungy jump purpose.

Now the local VDC official and leaders want the bridge to be handed over to them and the company use the facility in a lease agreement. But, the company says that they had build and paid for the bridge and can’t hand it over to the local people. If the local insist on taking over the bridge it will certainly prove to be a bad example for investors. Some argue, what will happen if people in Gorkha ask for the ownership of the Manakamana Cable Car or locals in Kulekhani ask for the ownership of the hydropower project over there.

The copy of the press release:

Case filed against Rubel Chowdhary

Dec 23, 2010 @ 15:45

A case has been filed against Rubel Chowdhary, son in law of Deputy Prime Minister Sujata Koirala, in Supreme Court on Thursday. The case was filed against Chowdhary, a Bangladeshi national for involving in illegal activities such as Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) service scam.

Chowdhary, not only was charged against the VoIP scam but also is accused of being involved with passport forgery case in Nepal.

Advocate Jayantra Bahadur Thakuri filed the summoned petition against Chowdhary. Meanwhile, Nepali Congress general secretary Mr. Prakash Man Singh spoke against Chowdhary saying that he is equally worth investigated over allegations of his involvement in
illegal acts. The law should be equally valid for everybody and it should apply to him (Chowdhary) as well if found guilty.

22-year-old student murdered in Capital – Colleagues at her workplace suspected

Dec 26, 2010 @ 05:16

A 22-year-old girl, who was pursuing her studies in Capital city, was murdered by none other than her own colleagues at her workplace. It has been reported that police have enough evidence to prove that her own colleagues have murdered her.

Sarala Thapa, a student at 12th grade was found stuffed in sack with multiple head injuries. That sack was found in Bishnumati River at Gongabu on Tuesday.

There were two main evidences that police found made them believe that the murder was none other than her own colleague at her workplace. The recovery of a piece of clothe from her workplace and an audio clip of a conversation between Thapa and Sahil Khan led the investigators to suspect the murderer of Thapa. The motive behind the murder by her colleagues however was not clear. Police have arrested Sahil Khan, Alam Khan and Angila Thapa as suspects for Sarala Thapa’s murderer.

CA Member killed in road accident

Dec 27, 2010 @ 03:45

CPN-UML Constituent Assembly member Dambar Bahadur Khadka was killed in an accident that took place in Bhaktapur district on Saturday night at around 8:30 pm. He was riding on the motorbike when a passenger bus hit the motorbike at Kaushaltar. Police have arrested the bus driver.
Dambar Bahadur Khadka was elected to the Constituent Assembly from Shankhwasabha Constituency No. 2.

Nepali Girls saved from traffickers in Goa

Dec 27, 2010 @ 17:09

Three Nepali girls, including one minor, were rescued from the traffickers in Goa on Saturday, 25 December, 2010.

According to police in Goa, among three of the Nepali girls, one was minor, who were promised by the traffickers to get job at casino as dancers. However, the three victims were pushed into prostitution later. Thankfully, the girls were lucky on Christmas day to be rescued; they were taken to the state protective on the same day.

Two persons were arrested for trafficking Nepali girls in Goa. They have been identified as Nandisha gowda, 25 from Bangalore and Hanumant Patel, 25 from Rajasthan. Both will be booked under the Immoral Trafficking Prevention Act and Goa Children’s Act for trafficking the girls, including minor.

A baby born with two heads

Dec 29, 2010 @ 03:38

A mother from Dailekh district VDC-9 has gave birth to a child with two heads. Bishnukala Nepali, 37, gave birth to a female child having two heads on the way to the local Balekanda sub health post on Sunday afternoon.

The detailed report on this is still being awaited. No details on this have been reported.

At least three injured in Bomb Blast

Dec 31, 2010 @ 03:59

At least three people were injured in a bomb blast that took place near a hardware store in Surkhet road in Nepalgunj. The three people that were injured in the blast have been identified as Kausal Acharya, Yubraj Chalise and Dilli Regmi. The injured people have been admitted to Bheri Zonal Hospital for treatment.
All the shops were closed following the blast in the city. No further on who may have been involved in the blast has been so far reported.

A mother filed a complaint to the police about bullying. Her complain was against some local boys who have been, for past few days, making mockery of her daughter named Munni. It was complained that boys sung the famous song of an Indian movie Dabang, ‘Munni badnaam Hui Darling Tere Liye‘ whenever Munni passed by her neighborhood.

This had been like a daily routine for the local boys against Munni, and the family was very irritated by the unwelcomed and disturbing activity made by their neighbors. Munni’s mother pleaded to boys not to show such behavior against her daughter but in vain. Instead, boys would defend themselves by saying “what is harm in singing famous song like this”. It had been very difficult moments for the family to stay in such disturbing environment.

Finally, Munni’s mother decided to report this incident to the police after her friends suggested her to do so. Munni’s mother was reluctant to go to the police at first fearing that the embarrassing story would spread like a fire all over cities and it would be even more intolerable for her family.
It was sighing of relief for the family for a week. But the local boys started singing the song “My name is Shila..Shila ki Jawani…” from the Hindi movie ‘Tees Mar Khan’. Coincidently, Munni’s mother name is Shila. The local boys came to know about Mother’s name after she had reported her daughter’s incident. The family’s story got even worse after Shila’s name was revealed in the neighborhood. The local boys would sing both songs whenever the mother and the daughter would pass by the neighborhood.

It was excruciating for the mother and the daughter to stay in such neighborhood that does not have respect for the family. And therefore, they decided to move to different place in the city by changing their names.
The questions to be pondered upon are:

• Should the mother and daughter have moved out just because the song was sung after their names? Were they so embarrassed that their lives were like hell?
• Who would you blame for all the coincidences?
• Should the song writer be blamed for writing such provocative songs? Or should such movies be banned?
• What would you do if such incident happened to you?