• Gorkhapatra and Nepal

How to save the government mouthpiece, the oldest newspaper in the country, many reports have been prepared by different committees at different times.

Gorkhapatra was started during the Rana days and it served the nation during the Panchayat days as the government mouthpiece.

When multiparty democracy was introduced, the concept of running mouthpieces by the government was questioned. Every time, when the parties remain in opposition, they demand for making the publication house an autonomous body or privatise it. When the very party joins the government, they continue to run it as a government mouthpiece.

Like the government, the Gorkhapatra Corporation is also unstable as leaderships change there along with the change of the government. It has ended the value of journalism and the Corporation is facing a big financial loss. The same applies to other media run by the government. This doesn’t end here but in all the governmentrun corporations and industries, the situation is the same.

If such investments have to be saved, they should be allowed to run autonomously by maintaining the value of professionalism.

Many government-run industries were operating in profit during the panchayat days but are presently closed. Every time, when a new government is formed, the ministers’ first decision will be to make effort to run those closed industries. Different committees will be formed for resuming the industries but they never start.

The reason, we know, is the political leaders who are not keen to run such government undertakings giving employment to thousands of locals. The reason we know that if poverty among the people is eliminated, the vote price will increase. Leaders don’t want to increase the vote.