THE GLOBAL AND THE LOCAL

May 10, 2016 Prashant Jha, noted journalist who spends most of his time in Delhi, is often suspected by Nepali readers to be too close to India’s RAW, India’s external intelligence agency. This is not based on suspicion and paranoia but from intelligence gleaned from some of his columns, in which he’s written about the change of guards at RAW and shown an all too close familiarity with its upper echelons. Mr. Jha, who regularly makes appearances at Nepali events in the USA, was a fellow at the Asia Society of New York, a visiting fellow at the Center for the Advanced Study of India (UPenn), and is a 2016 Poynter Fellow at Yale, recently put out an op-ed from the esteemed Hindusthan Times , in which he claimed several Chinamen were seen approaching various members of the Nepali political world, including Maoist leader Prachanda, telling them to desist from regime change, and to support Oli’s government. His May 10, 2016 article, titled “ Chinese advice behind Prachanda’s U-turn on...

Check out my article " Between A Rock and a Hard Place " about civilians caught in Nepal's conflict, from the 26th issue of Nation Weekly magazine. The magazine is archived at Digital Himalaya in Cambridge University.

The Annapurna Post asked me to contribute an article this Dashain. And since it was a day or so away from Navami, I decided to write this article.                                                                            *** Navaratri is dedicated to nine forms of Goddess Durga, consort of Lord Shiva. She appears in different forms: as Shailaputri or daughter of the Himalayas on the first day of  ghatasthapana ; as virginal Brahmacharini on the second day; as Chandraghanta, wearing a crown made of the moon in the shape of a bell on her head on the third; as Kusmanda, the one who embodies the universe, on the fourth; as Skandamata, mother of Kartikya who slays demon Tarkasur, on the fifth day; as Katyayani, who slays the demon Mahisasur, on the sixth; as Kaalratri, who reminds us of the ine...

I spent a year in New York in 2001 interning with Forefront: A Network of Human Rights Advocates, an advocacy organization that was supported human rights advocates from developing countries. BASE, the organization at the forefront of eliminating bonded labor in Nepal, was one of their partners, and while I was there my job was to support its work. When Khum Bahadur Khadga, the then Home Minister, tried to strip BASE of its NGO status, I was the little intern behind the scenes who drafted the advocacy letter that was eventually signed by Jimmy Carter and sent via the Carter Center, asking the Nepal Government to restore BASE's legal status. I put out this little bit of history in response to Diwakar Zha's article in Setopati, in which he seems to suggest I must be in favor of bonded labor because I critique the Human Rights Watch's biased report, in which they selective edit information to make it appear all those who oppose the "One Madhesh, One Pradesh" and su...

This is a followup to my previous article titled “Was the Human Rights Watch biased?” I’d like to thank Mr. Rob Penner for factchecking that article. And indeed there are factual errors: After watching Youtube videos and reading up on past articles, it appears the Andolan was in full force in August, most of the killings (47 killed according to commentators) occurred from August 10 th  onwards and was over by September, the Constitution was promulgated on September 20, and the blockade started September 23. So there were factual errors in my article, for which I take full responsibility. In my defense, I’d like to say I haven’t had access to a TV or even newspapers since April 25, 2015, and that I’ve been in and out of hospitals from multiple operations from a fractured foot and arm caused by the earthquake, and that my access to information is not as linear as it should be.  I was wrong and I apologize for the confusion.  However, the major points of m...

265   105   0   370 GET NEWS ALERTS One of the big arguments in Nepal recently has been whether a certain Mr. Rob Penner had been right in questioning a wide array of human rights activists, journalists and others about their observations that the Human Rights Watch’s 2015 report on Nepal was biased. In the view of his supporters, Mr. Rob Penner is above all criticism because he was on the side of human rights, and therefore it followed that everybody who questioned his methods must be on the wrong side of history. But let's look at this a little bit more indepth. Mr. Penner, “Chief Scientist” of Cloud Factory, an outsourcing company, took it upon himself to factcheck the logic and veracity of people questioning the neutrality of the Human Rights Watch Report. Titled “Like we are not Nepali,” the report at first hand is a well-written and well-researched report of human rights abuses by the security forces in the Southern part of...

308     44     0     352   GET NEWS ALERTS Rob Penner, Canadian national, who noted his position as “chief scientist” at the outsourcing company Cloud Factory, has become the faultline of a bitter public divide on Nepal. The Nepal government deported him in early May, giving him two days notice to pack up. The ostensible reason was immigration violation, and disturbing social harmony. A slew of international op-eds in support of Mr. Penner immediately followed from the New York Times, the Globe and Mail, as well as Human Rights Watch. He became a bit of a hero on social media, although there were also equal numbers of detractors noting that he went from “Zero to Hero,” in the manner of C.K Raut and Angkaaji Sherpa, two other individuals who’d come to prominence after advocating for radical solutions to Nepali problems. His supporters say he was a great advocate of the Madheshi movement and therefore of human rig...