It was sad to read about Ganesh Nepali lighting himself up to protest the so-called traffic violation he faced. He is no longer with us. But what happened after that has not only shocked us all but also, in some ways, made us ashamed of our own civic sense as well.
The KMC Nagar Prahari are no longer on the streets, and our footpath byaparis have made a comeback, and our great Nepalis have decided to park anywhere they like in the New Road area. I guess we love chaos more than following the rules and making our city a better place to live.
Our footpath byaparis figured that the KMC Police would be scared to come out on duty a day after the incident and then decided to recapture their lost empires, filling up the sidewalks with clothes, shoes, and stuff you need for the monsoon season! I guess the sidewalks are meant for our byaparis rather than the pedestrians! We should call it a great victory for free-market anarchy, which proves that our collective civic sense was merely an illusion, and we go back to the 'Stone Age' once uniforms disappear from street corners!
I guess the government wanted to bring things under control, and they have signed a 9-point agreement with the victim's family, but our municipal police seem to get the blame for the light-up incident! The victim's family wants the frontline officers involved in the incident suspended and even charged with murder. And as usual, we now have a committee under a former judge to investigate the whole incident!
The KMC Police are now suffering from a severe crisis of morale, and they feel that the public may resort to physical assault every time they try to enforce the KMC rules regarding parking and footpath management! We hope that our KMC wallahs will provide some training to their police force to be more professional and courteous to the public, but also not back down from enforcing the KMC rules and regulations in the city!
Our Home Minister did his best trying to figure out what could be done to save Ganesh Nepali's life, but his standing tall at the parliament rostrum and blaming the local KMC police and those in charge of running the city was, I guess, some kind of political escapism!
I think the Home Ministry should realize that KMC police are doing a good job and also lowering the burden from Nepal Police when it comes to local traffic management and stuff. This is not the time to play the blame game, but also ask Nepal Police to be a partner and not walk away when KMC Police need some backup when dealing with the usual 'law-breaking' crowd!
Our drivers also need to be aware that they do not have the right to park anywhere they please. The whole city is not your grandfather's backyard, where you can do anything you like as long as grandpa doesn't mind, or else he too will hit you with his belt or a bamboo stick if you act like English football hooligans!
It's time to look in the mirror and remind ourselves that if we really want to be a better country, then we need to abide by the laws, and it starts from the streets. True civic sense should not require a threat of a fine, and we all need to respect local laws as well!
The Municipal Police Act of 2080 BS and the financial penalty structures passed in 2082 BS were designed to make Kathmandu a clean European-style city. And the fines, if the parliament allows, will also go up in the coming days. Some of us complain that we do not have the income to pay the Euro-style fines. Still, maybe we can scare our unruly lawbreakers with massive fines so that they won't park anywhere or our footpath byaparis will not hog the sidewalks and make pedestrians walk on the main road again!
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