National security doctrine must address threats due to porous border

 National security doctrine must address threats due to porous border

Dr Kanchan Dahal

The Annapurna Express

March 20, 2023, 1:08 a.m.

When a comprehensive philosophy of national interests starts to have gaps in public life domains, a nation starts embarking on the journey of failure. Any possible conflict of interest within ruling institutions exacerbates crises. Contemporary political discourse determines the course a nation is taking, the outcome in the form of success or failure. This opens another avenue of debate whether only the political system is the mother of all policies, as articulated by political leaders in Nepal. When Nepal has been witnessing complex phenomena, outside geographic territory and even in space, it will be worthwhile to explore, learn and apply the requirements of the present.  We have been witnessing threats in different aspects of our lives and this threatens national stability and our image in regional as well as global fora.  Should we witness the happenings or start taking actions is our choice and our choice will determine our future course. Revising the history of our nation and observing the world around us, it has become clear that we have been experiencing hostility in the form of coercive conflicts and aggressions, immature government and non-government policies, political espionage, and inappropriate interference in elections.  Terrorism has been a huge threat in various forms like physical violence and cyber-crime proliferation. Taking caution and presuming possible physical violence, aggression and eliminating such elements is what security forces should do. For instance, recently, we have experienced the sight of different threatening objects in public places and places of national interest. Various financial crimes, including stealing and extortion as well as harmful agendas, are sprouting with the use of cyber gateways.  We are witnessing how a pandemic can be a threat to not just a country but the whole world. For instance, Covid-19 has caused tragic deaths, widespread social and economic havoc, and mental health issues. In the past two years, the highly contagious strain has caused the closure of many small and big businesses temporarily or even permanently, resulting in huge losses. Travel, hospitality sectors and industries have been impacted disproportionately.  The cumulative effects of economic loss and rise in unemployment are likely to destabilize society. This pandemic is a reminder that the threat is ever present. Therefore, it is imperative to take measures for the protection of citizens.  When in need, we accepted aid in the form of vaccinations, technologies, oxygen plants and medicines, etc from different countries. Now, we should set up research facilities for the development and testing of vaccines, medicines, technologies and provide training to public health workers to deal with similar outbreaks. 

Natural disasters also pose a big threat, with climate change exacerbating it further.  The (Gorkha) Earthquake in 2015, tornado in 2019 and the Melamchi flash flood (2021) were some of the disasters that took many lives, caused huge economic losses and left the citizens traumatized. Climate change causes irregular rain patterns and droughts, disrupting traditional agriculture practices and affecting the supply chain. Huge losses of lives and properties are the consequences of natural disasters aggravated by climate change. Choice is in our hands to explore methods and develop practices that can slow down climate change and mitigate its impacts.

Transnational crimes are other sets of problems threatening our country. Human trafficking, illicit drug trafficking, business infiltrations, extortions, transfer of illegal weapons, and harmful ideologies are creating adverse situations in Nepal. A regional approach is a must to deal with these challenges.  Nepal faces a wide range of threats with implications for the entire region. The time has come to develop appropriate response strategies by giving our emergency response efforts due priority, identifying the loopholes and creating an atmosphere for peace, stability and safety on a regional basis.  The author is with the Ministry of Home Affairs 

Playing cops and robbers

 

Playing cops and robbers

Nepal’s administrative and police structures were grafts from the British imperial model.
Deepak Thapa

As a child studying in India, I remember hearing about these very important individuals—“the DC” and “the DM”. Even though I was told that “DC” and “DM” stood for the portentous-sounding “Deputy Commissioner” and “District Magistrate”, to my young mind their importance sprang from the fact that they went around with red beacons flashing atop their cars. Much later I figured out that the DC and the DM were the same person and who also sported another “DC” title, that of “District Collector”.

In essence, it was the same guy (was always a guy) with three different hats: as the Deputy Commissioner, he was the chief executive of the district, as the District Magistrate, he was the person responsible for maintaining law and order, and as the District Collector, he was the chief taxman. This personage literally had power over life and liberty of everyone in the district. With just around 350 districts in all of India at the time, the domain he controlled would have been pretty substantial.

That was the administrative structure dreamt up by the British colonial administration to keep Indians under its thumb. For the express purpose of subjugation, assisting the DC-DM was another important official, the Superintendent of Police, who headed the district police force.

British imperial model

It has been said that to keep a check on its far-flung territories, the British Empire had the choice of either setting up a civilian police force with unarmed personnel such as the bobbies of the London Metropolitan Police or an imperial one like the para-military Royal Irish Constabulary, created specifically to put down Irish separatists. For obvious reasons, the colonies received a police force that had worked for Britain so well in Ireland, and India was no exception. In fact, there was no hiding their intent with Sir Hugh Rose, the commander-in-chief of the Indian army in the mid-19th century, being attributed the words: “No system of police has ever worked better for the suppression of political agitation or agrarian disorder than the Irish constabulary.”

Unfortunately, for Nepal, as it transitioned into the modern era in the 1950s and transformation from a feudocracy to liberal nationhood, both our administrative and police structures were grafted from the British imperial model upon the recommendation of Indian advisers. Thus, our Chief District Officer has shades of the authority granted to India’s Deputy Commissioner-cum-District Magistrate (the role of the Collector seems to have been withheld because the Ranas had a pretty effective system of tax collection in place). It is for the same reason we have a police force that, as a top Indian police official, KS Dhillon, has said, “is there for the protection of…the rulers, the establishment, it is not there for the protection of the people”.

Apart from the imperial police orientation itself, another factor that contributed to the wide distance between the police and the people in Nepal is that for the first two decades and more, the Nepal Police was headed by a succession of Gurkha veterans from the British Army. They had no reason to take issue with the national police undergoing regimentation akin to an armed force. Echoing Dhillon, a ranking former official in the Nepal Police, Govinda Prasad Thapa, writes “the police was established with a revolutionary and military culture, with the primary objective of supporting the political regime or government in power. Service to the people was a secondary concern”.

Do we not know it well? Protection of the rulers often takes that most innocuous form, the “transfer”, the tried and tested trick for use by the government of the day as and when required. Witness the recent transfer of 18 Superintendents of Police in the run-up to the upcoming local election. Who would believe that these 18 were shuffled around since the government wanted to ensure a free and fair election?

Not that there have not been efforts to project a more friendly face of the police with campaigns such as “community police” and “Prahari Mero Sathi” (My Friend, the Police). Recalls Thapa, community policing included getting involved in programmes such as women’s literacy, public health, environmental preservation and youth activities. But there were naysayers within the force because they “failed to realise that it is possible to be community-friendly while simultaneously being an effective police officer”. As for the second attempt, I cannot imagine there being many takers of the possibility that police behaviour could change overnight with just a snappy slogan but no concrete action against any violation of trust in the touted police-public friendship.

As I have pointed out previously, one reason for the inability of the police to be more people-friendly could be because they are grossly overworked. A 2016 internal police document found that under the authority of 44 different acts, the Nepal Police are burdened with 1,008 different tasks, having to do with gambling, essential services, the civil code, donations, forestry, passports, and so on, besides fighting crime. That does not appear to be so uncommon. Take the British government white paper on police reform in England and Wales which says that the police face a lot of demands and that although the “main job of the police is to catch criminals…only about 18% of calls to the police are about crime”. Basically, policing involves a lot more than playing cops and robbers, as our own police would know very well.

Fake police officers

Despite these overwhelming responsibilities, what is amazing is that some police officials still find time to engage in “extra-curricular” activities. A sure indication of the kind of weight the police throw around is the arrest of “fake police officers” that makes it to the news regularly. Without the involvement of the actual police in all sorts of nefarious dealings, it would not make sense for crooks to pretend to be cops. A Google search for “fake police 2022” (in Nepali) showed the following on the first page itself: “Two arrested for cheating in the garb of fake police”; “Eight arrested for looting by impersonating police”; “Fake police ASI arrested from Bhadrakali”; and “Fake police arrested with drugs”. And, we are just in the third month of the year.

Police reform that had started after the end of the Maoist conflict did not go anywhere. But change it has to in order to tackle the many problems ailing it, and it needs to start at the very top. A good example what is possible comes from Robert Mark, who headed the London Metropolitan Police in the 1970s. Asked what he hoped to achieve, he is reported to have said “arrest more criminals than we employ”. As his obituary noted: “His achievement…was to make corrupt officers within the Met—and there were literally hundreds of them—feel like outsiders themselves.”

Any takers in the Nepal Police?

https://tkpo.st/3vSqcTP

जाजरकोटमा भूकम्प

 जाजरकोटमा भूकम्प

 

२० कार्तिक २०८०

२०८० कार्तिक १७ गते राति रूकुम र जाजरकोटमा ६.४ रेक्टर स्केलको भुकम्प गएको छ । जाजरकोट भूकम्पमा परि १ सय ५३ जनाको मृत्यु भएको छ। २ सय ५६ जना घाइते छन्। भूकम्पले ९ सय ३७ वटा घर पूर्ण र २ हजार ९ सय ५४ घरलाई आंशिक क्षति पुर्‍याएको छ।

सरकारले मृतकका परिवारलाई २ लाख, घरविहीन भएकालाई अस्थायी टहरा निर्माणका लागि ५० हजार र तत्काल राहत आवश्यक पर्ने परिवारलाई २० हजार रुपैयाँ दिने निर्णय गरेको छ।

भूकम्प प्रभावितको उद्धार तथा राहत र अस्थायी आवास निर्माणका लागि सरकारले ७ सय ४० प्रहरी, ३ सय ३४ जना सशस्त्र प्रहरी, र २ सय ६३ जना नेपाली सेना समेत जाजरकोट र रुकुम पश्चिम जिल्लामा परिचालन गरेको गृह मन्त्रालयले जनाएको छ।

भूकम्पबाट जाजरकोट, रुकुम पश्चिम, रुकुम पूर्व, सल्यान, रोल्पा, नवलपरासी पूर्व, दैलेख, दाङ बैतडी र जुम्ला प्रभावित छन्।

२०७२ को विनाशकारी महाप्रलयलाई स्मरण गर्दा यस्तो चरित्र अझ छर्लङ्ग हुन्छ । त्यो विपद्ले सिंगो देश एउटै संकट र पीडामा पर्‍यो । र, त्यो संकटले गर्दा नेपाली समाज र राजनीतिमा एउटा लोभलाग्दो भाइचारा देखियो । २०७२ असोज ३ गते संविधान घोषणाको जग त्यही भावनात्मक एकता, संवेदना र भाइचारा थियो ।

जाजरकोट भूकम्पका पीडितहरूले उद्धार र राहत समयमा नपाउँदा दैनिकी कष्टकर बनिरहेको गुनासो पछि राष्ट्रिय मानव अधिकार आयोगको टोलीले सो बारे विस्तृत अनुगमन गर्ने भएको छ।

जाजरकोट भूकम्पबाट पीडित परिवारलाई सरकारले उपलब्ध गराइरहेको राहत तथा उद्धारको प्रभावकारिताबारे राष्ट्रिय मानव अधिकार आयोगले अनुगमन गर्ने भएको हो।दुई सदस्यलाई मंगलबारदेखि जाजरकोट र रुकुम पश्चिम जिल्लाको अनुगमनका लागि आयोगले खटाएको हो। पीडितको मानव अधिकार संरक्षण, राहतमा पहुँचको अवस्था र सरकारी संयन्त्रहरूले विपत्मा खेलिरहेको भूमिकाबारे आयोगले अनुगमन गर्ने छ।

नेपाली समाजमा उपभोक्तावाद र स्वार्थी चिन्तन नभएको होइन । राजनीतिक वृत्तदेखि अरू विभिन्न क्षेत्रमा ‘मै खाऊँ, मै लाऊँ’ प्रवृत्ति मनग्गे छ । तर जब राष्ट्रिय जीवनमा संकट आएर देश थलिन्छ, यहाँ लोभलाग्दो एकता अनि भाइचारा देखिन्छ । खेलकुदले खुसी दिलाउँदा होस् वा भूकम्पले उठिबास लगाउँदा, दुवै अवस्थामा एकै ठाउँमा उभिने, एउटै खाले उत्साह अनि पीडाबोध गर्ने नेपाली समाजको संस्कार तारिफ गर्न लायकको छ ।

श्रोतः विभिन्न समाचार पत्र हरू