Development in a developing state…..

Development in a developing state…..

The weather made me stay in Rumjatar for seven days. Whole world was making merry in the wake of Dashain season but I had no other choice that to look at the sky and pray for it to clear up. The news of helicopter crash including state minister along with high officials from WFP made days more gloomier. As passengers from flights of seven days accumulated in Rumjatar, fooding charges in the hotels there were hiked. As the days passed on, “dal” in those hotels got thinner and thinner, bed bugs got fatter and fatter, fleas had the party time, autocracy of Nepal Airlines manager rose, pit-hole toilets were filling up fast and both topic of conversation and stock of food were emptying.

Those dull days of stay in Rumjatar was made interesting by meeting with people from different fields. Myself being from the medical field was compelled to get amused in the company of a young geologist, a near-retiring road engineer, a group of sociologists, few district level political bigwigs, a group of patients and their relatives and few businessmen. The conversation was lively especially when we talked about politicians (that was the only common topic among the diverse group) and when we cursed the weather. A decision to form a society of office bearers in Okhaldhunga was tabled in the mean time. Plan to waste Saturdays with playing cards was formulated. It was decided to send a delegation to district CDO asking for a separate phone lines for the offices to make communication easier.

It was amazing to know from the outsiders that how every little happening in the hospital became the talk of the town. Who got what sort of disease, who broke which bone of which of his enemy, who was bitten by whose dog, who gave birth to how many babies, who died of what disease and whose prediction about his death came out to be true. Everything that happened in hospital was savored by people of Okhaldhunga with gusto. And it was equally amazing to know how version varied from people to people. Gossip mongers were at large at Okhaldhunga. I cleared few of the confusions people had about the way hospital was functioning. I tried my best to make people understand how difficult it is to practice medicine in Okhaldhunga but as expected, it was not well taken by the crowd. For the geologist, testing the soil of different variety found here was the most difficult job. For the engineer, convincing people to let them use their field for constructing a new road was the most difficult job. For the sociologists, using (or misusing) the donor fundings with quick and visible outcome was the major problem. Businessmen had all the problems because of the road link that was being planned as they were used to making more profit with the air-lifted goods. Politicians concluded all these problems are not dealt only because their parties and themselves were not in the power. In short, not only me, everybody was complaining and everybody was not satisfied. I thought that was Okhaldhunga for you…

I was not an expert in developmental studies. But what I felt was that development should go ahead in package. Co-ordination between the development agencies was so poor that it created some funny pictures in the name of development. I was told that on the way to Sunkoshi from Okhaldhunga, there is road link but no bridge and towards Solu, there was a bridge built but no roads connecting to it. In the name of infrastructure development aid, different INGOs has built buildings for the schools in different villages but as Education Ministry had no plans to expand the capacity of those schools, the newly-built houses are being used as goat-shelters. Wireless technologies in telecommunication were all available in cities but it was not there in places like Okhaldhunga where it needed the most.

Roads, Education, Health, Communication, Agriculture, Electricity and industries; all should come to the place like Okhaldhunga in a package. If one form comes before another, there will be a chaos. In Health Okhaldhunga had an ideal full fledged hospital but hospital itself is sick as there were no roads, no electricity and no communication. Same thing will happen to any industry if they plan to run in this place. Without industry or good agricultural potentials, there will be no employment opportunities and Okhaldhunga will just remain as a source of cheap manpower to the developed countries. Arun third (if gets completed) will be a wonder to Sankhuwasabha just like Kaligandaki has been to Syangja. But for Okhaldhunga no plans are on the pipeline on which people can stick their hopes. Here, tourism is dead, industries are impossible, agricultural products cant sustain its own people for whole year, education is non-existent and all its young generation are either in war or are outside the country. God knows what it takes for the flourishment of this place…..

I knew impatience is not a virtue. But as the days passed in Rumjatar, I could feel it in everybody’s face. The only functioning telephone in Rumjhatar also got dead as there was no sunlight for their batteries to get charged. That added more to our woes. Nobody had any idea about how to conquer the weather. All of us felt extorted by none other than the weather. Thanks to some of the passengers who knew how to infuse life to a dead situation and amused everybody around us with their gift of the gab and their acute sense of humor. It was because of them I felt if we had to celebrate Dashain in that place; it won’t be the worst Dashain I ever had.

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