News of former lawmaker Gayatri Shah and her husband being arrested for abandoning their new-born has been featured in some newspapers along with the news of a Chinese group’s hacking of government websites.
Here is a summary of important, ignored and interesting stories from the front pages of national broadsheets:
Important
NCP, NC divided over railroad funding
Republica reports that two major political parties — the ruling Nepal Communist Party (NCP) and the main opposition Nepali Congress (NC) — appear sharply divided over how to fund the Nepal-China railroad, which requires an investment of several billion of dollars.
While the main opposition party has categorically stated that Nepal should develop the cross-country railroad only through grants, the ruling NCP is in favour of expediting the project even if it requires taking loans.
Shah and husband held for abandoning their newborn
The Himalayan Times reports that former Nepali Janata Dal lawmaker Gayatri Shah and her husband Rajesh Mahato have been arrested by the Metropolitan Police Range, Lalitpur, for leaving their newborn baby with Down Syndrome at Nepal Mediciti Hospital.
Shah and Mahato were arrested from Bhaisepati, Lalitpur, at around 4pm on Sunday based on the complaint filed by the hospital. Shah was admitted to the hospital at around 10:30 am on March 12. She underwent Caesarean operation that same day and gave birth to the baby.
It was Shah’s second pregnancy. She had terminated her first after learning that the foetus had down syndrome. Shah has accused the hospital of not informing her about her unborn baby’s condition when she was pregnant for the second time.
She spent nearly a month at the hospital before being discharged on April 4. Shah and her husband, however, refused to take their baby with them.
Ignored
Govt has no explanation why its websites weren’t working
The Kathmandu Post reports that the National Information Technology Centre had no idea why all government websites were down on Sunday. The centre, which falls under the Ministry of Communication and Information Technology and hosts all government websites, initially said the sites would be up and running almost immediately, but the error message on the sites remained for more than six hours.
Cybersecurity experts say the nearly daylong blackout of government sites could have possibly been the doing of malicious actors who tied up the sites’ resources and prevented legitimate users from accessing the sites by flooding the government server which, they say, is highly vulnerable to security risks.
But, Naya Patrika reports that the sites were down because it was hacked by Chinese hackers.
Deputy Director General at the NITC Ramesh Prasad Pokharel said Chinese hackers had been trying to hit the websites of the Nepal government for the last four days.
ADB to float Nepali bonds in overseas market
The Himalayan Times reports that Asian Development Bank is planning to float Nepali rupee-denominated bonds of up to $500 million in the overseas market to raise funds for the construction of physical infrastructure projects in Nepal.
The Manila-based multilateral lending institution had expressed this interest upon Finance Minister Yubaraj Khatiwada’s request. The minister had told the ADB that the long overdue plan to issue local currency bonds should now be rolled out as Nepal needs capital for long-term investment. But these securities, the minister said, should not be sold in the domestic market until the problem of shortage of loanable funds is fully resolved.
Questions being asked about PM’s visit to Cambodia and Vietnam
The Kathmandu Post reports that foreign policy experts and a section of leaders, however, have expressed concerns over Prime Minister’s KP Sharma Oli’s upcoming visits to the Southeast Asian nations, saying that Nepal neither has much diplomatic engagement nor significant interactions in terms of trade and investments with them.
According to them, the visits also contradict the government-announced policy of financial austerity to lessen the burden on state coffers.
The main opposition Nepali Congress has expressed concerns over Oli’s visit to countries like Cambodia, saying it wonders whether he wants to learn a lesson or two from the political system the country practices.
Interesting
Govt to recover encroached land
Nagarik reports that the government has initiated a process to bring back the encroached land of Lalita Niwas under government’s ownership. The Ministry of Land Management and Cooperatives is preparing to table a proposal in the next cabinet meeting to bring back all public land acquired by various individual across the nation under the government’s ownership.
Trade deficit likely when pushing for economic growth: FM
Karobar reports that finance minister Yuba Raj Khatiwada has said that Nepal would continue to face a trade deficit if it wanted economic growth. He further added that to cut the trade deficit and push for economic growth, the government needed to look after external areas. Speaking at the meeting attended by all of SAARC countries finance ministers, Khatiwada said that Nepal was heading in the right path as it recorded a growth of 7 per cent or more for the third year in a row. He added that cooperation of all SAARC countries was necessary for the development of the region.
Gold and Silver prices fall
Arthik Abhiyan reports that the price of gold and silver fell over the trading week between April 28 and May 3. Gold prices came down by Rs 800 per tola, while the price of silver too fell by Rs 20 a tola. According to the Federation of Nepal Gold and Silver Dealers’ Association, the gold price fell due to the strengthening of the US dollar in the international market, which dented the appeal of gold. Likewise, the Indian currency also became stronger in the review period, which in turn caused the gold price to drop in the Nepali market.
