Nepal

Kathmandu, July 4

It was a regular Saturday for Devi Prasad Poudel of Kathmandu, on June 29. He had lunch with his wife and 16-year-old daughter, Sadikshya. After lunch, his wife was occupied with domestic chores and Sadikshya left for her room. Poudel left home to attend to a business.

Later in the afternoon, Sadikshyamother felt eerie silence in her home. That was when she went to check on her daughter. What she saw after opening the door left her frozen in shock and disbelief. Her child was dead! Sadikshya had committed suicide by hanging.

Sadikshya was not an introvert. She was good at public speaking and had interest in music, dance and acting, according to Poudel. But results of the Secondary Education Examination were published on June 27 had dampened her spirit.

&She was hoping to secure A+ but had scored A,& Poudel said. &We had consoled her saying that her grade was okay.& It is has not been confirmed if the SEE grade had prompted her suicide as police are still trying to find out the cause of the suicide.

A day before Sadikshya took her own life, Samir Lungwa, an 11-year-old boy from Lalitpur Bagmati-2, Malta, had also committed suicide. In a suicide note, Samir wrote that he had felt neglected by his parents, brother and teachers.

Sadikshya and Samir are two of the 216 children across Nepal, who committed suicide in the first nine months of the current fiscal from mid-July 2018 to mid-April 2019. Of the children (people below 18) who committed suicide this year, almost 64 per cent, or 138, were girls and 78 were boys, according to Nepal Police. Most of them, 80.6 per cent had committed suicide by hanging themselves. Other causes of suicide were poison consumption, setting oneself ablaze and drowning.

Children who committed suicide account for 5.5 per cent of the total suicides recorded this fiscal year. Suicide is an outcome of depression, according to Arun Raj Kunwar, child and adolescent psychiatrist at Kanti ChildrenHospital. &Children get depressed when their parents demand higher grades, when they are continuously bullied or face discrimination, when they have to deal with chronic health problems or when they face relationship issues,& Kunwar said.

These days, children even take their own lives if their demand for material goods is not met or if parents disapprove their friendship with someone, according to Neena Rai, assistant professor at the Department of Psychiatry, KIST Medical College.

&These may sound like petty reasons to commit suicide, but there are children who feel ignored when they face rejection from parents. This can cause stress and depression in them,& said Kunwar.

Many parents in Nepal are not aware that children too can become victims of depression, according to Kunwar. Worse, many parents think depression is a severe mental disorder. So, many children do not even report their depressive state. This is what compounds the problem, according to Kunwar.

Children who are depressed may express feelings of hopelessness, display rage and mood swings, increase consumption of alcohol or drugs, show anxiety, act recklessly, and withdraw from family, friends and social circles. They may also lose self-esteem and self-confidence.

&If parents and teachers notice these behavioural changes, they must seek help,& according to Rai. Kanti Children Hospital is one such place where help can be sought. It offers 24-hour helpline service for troubled children. &We provide counselling service to children from our helpline. We also reach out to parents and tell them to immediately take their children to nearby health centres that offer mental health service if the counselling doesn&t work,& said Ram Pukar Shah, consultant psychologist at the hospital. The hospital gets an average of two calls a day on its helpline from children facing depression. The hospitalChild and Adolescent Psychiatry Out Patient Department also receives around 30 child patients facing mental health problems, such as depression, on a daily basis.

There are particular occasions when child suicide rate jumps. Many children commit suicide right after SEE results are published. Child suicide rate also increases during the crop plantation season when pesticides and insecticides are stored in houses.&Parents should be careful during these times,& said Kunwar.

The post 216 minors took own lives this fiscal appeared first on The Himalayan Times.

The suspects being made public at the Metropolitan Crime Division in Teku, on Thursday, July, 04, 2019. Courtesy: MCD

KATHMANDU: A police team deployed from the Metropolitan Crime Division arrested four persons on Thursday for allegedly cheating hundreds of people by offering smart card driving licences, but issuing fake ones instead.

Issuing a press statement today, MCD said, acting on a tip-off, police apprehended Munal Kumar Moktan (40) of Ramechhap district, Rajesh Kumar Shrestha (38) of Sindhupalchok district, Radheshyam Nagarkoti (38) of Kathmandu-8, and Rupendra Darji (27) of Kageshwori Manahara Municipality-1 on the charge of misusing government seal and signatures, from assorted locations in Kathmandu yesterday.

During the raid, police seized fake cash receipt of Department of Transport Management, a computer, printer, two sets of rubber stamp, citizenship certificates, and other items used for producing an illegal smart driving licence.

Meanwhile, an investigation into the case is underway, police said.

The post Fake driving licence racket busted, four held appeared first on The Himalayan Times.

Kathmandu, July 4

The Ministry of Federal Affairs and General Administration issued a circular to the bodies under its jurisdiction, Department of Civil Personnel Records, Department of Local Infrastructure Development and Agricultural Roads and district development committees, requesting them to impose a fine of Rs 5,000 each, on employees failing to submit property details for the fiscal 2017-18, on time.

The Internal Management Section of the MoFAGA directed the concerned offices to penalise erring employees, in response to the June 28 letter of the Commission for the Investigation of Abuse of Authority. An employee who has failed to submit his/her property details for 2017-18 will have to pay the fine within 30 days from the receipt of the letter and disclose property details within the next 30 days.

The MoFAGA has also provided the concerned offices with the names of 190 office-bearers who did not disclose their property details on time. They are from the offices under the jurisdiction of MoFAGA. They include under-secretaries, non-gazetted third class officers, engineers, computer operators, typists, sub-engineers, overseers, former village development committee secretaries, accountants and veterinary doctors.

Concerned offices have been asked to impose the fine on the employees and inform the CIAA of the action taken against the erring staffers. As per the Prevention of Corruption Act-2002, a person joining a public office is required to submit the statement of property in his/her or his/her family members& name, along with sources of income to the body prescribed by the government within 60 days from the date of joining the office, and thereafter within 60 days from the date of completion of each fiscal.

The concerned body or authority may extend the deadline for submission of property details for a maximum of 30 days. If the person assuming public office does not submit the statement of property within the extended time limit, he/she will be liable to a fine of Rs 5,000 and the concerned body or official may initiate investigation into the property in his/her and his/her family members& names.

Earlier, the National Vigilance Centre had sent personal details of 19,134 civil servants, and employees of the Nepali Army, Nepal Police and Armed Police Force to the anti-graft body for legal action as they failed to submit their property details for fiscal 2017-18.

The post MoFAGA to impose fine on non-compliant employees appeared first on The Himalayan Times.

Kathmandu, July 3

The Supreme Court today ordered the state-owned Paropakar Maternity and WomenHospital and one of its doctors to pay Rs 500,000 each as compensation to a person who became the victim of medical negligence.

A division bench of justices Purushottam Bhandari and Tanka Bahadur Moktan upheld the erstwhile PatanAppellate Court (now high court) verdict delivered in a case filed by Surya Kumari Adhikari.

Patan Appellate Court had upheld the District Compensation Committee Kathmanduverdict that had ordered Rs 500,000 each to be paid by Paropakar Maternity and WomenHospital and Dr Achala Devi Vaidya to Adhikari as compensation.

According to Forum for Protection of Consumer Rights lawyer Jyoti Baniya who pleaded on behalf of Adhikari, the doctor who was ordered by the lower court to pay Rs 500,000 did not appeal the Patan Appellate Courtverdict, but the hospital had filed an appeal at the Supreme Court, challenging the lower courtverdict.

&Today the SC upheld the lower courtverdict. This means both Dr Vaidya and the hospital will have to pay Rs 500,000 each, to Adhikari.

According to Baniya when Adhikari went to Paropakar Hospital, doctors told her that her unborn baby was overweight, but instead of performing C-section on her, the tending doctor recommended vacuum assisted delivery. Assisting staff of the doctor pulled the baby out of the motherwomb, at the fourth attempt.

Baniya said that the bungled delivery led to paralysis of arms and legs of the baby, who is now undergoing physical therapy.

Adhikari had visited the hospital on 27 February 2007 for delivery but the doctors had discharged her outright, saying she would require C-section as her baby was overweight. Later, she was admitted at the hospital on 10 March 2007 and as she was in intense labour pain she had requested the doctor for surgery. Both the doctor and nurses ignored her request.

On March 16 vacuum assisted method was used to pull the baby out of the motherwomb.

Adhikari had claimed a compensation of Rs 8230,000 from the defendants.

The hospital had been claiming that the vacuum assisted method was appropriate for the delivery of the baby in Adhikaricase.

The post SC orders hospital, doctor to compensate victim appeared first on The Himalayan Times.