The
Karnali Zone is the most poverty-stricken area of Nepal. The five
districts that make up this zone -- Dolpa, Humla, Jumla, Kalikot and
Mugu -- all come at the bottom of Nepal's district-wise human
development index. The Karnali people suffer from widespread hunger,
illiteracy, poor health, unemployment, and very low incomes.
Karnali
is isolated from the mainstream of development. It is the only zone in
Nepal which is not linked with the rest of the country by a road.
According to the UN's Human Development Report, the Karnali Zone is the
least developed area in Nepal with very low indicators of human
development. It is characterized by a growing population, environmental
degradation low productivity, annual disease epidemics and famines, a
weak educational system negligible employment opportunities, and growing
out-migration in search of work. Togetherthese represent the dire
poverty suffered by the Karnali Zone's inhabitants.
Some development initiatives such as establishing the Karnali Technical School and an agriculture
research centre in the zonal capital Jumla have gone ahead . But the
region stilllags way behind most of the rest of the country in terms of
transport facilities, access totechnology, and industrialization. The
whole of the Karnali Zone continues to depend on traditional
technologies and there is no infrastructure for industrial development.
The
completion date of the under-construction Surkhet to Jumla highway
keeps on being delayed. At the current rate it will take more than 20
years for this 220 km long road to be completed. Air transport is a very
important mode of transport but flights are unreliable and are often
cancelled . The airports that are being built in Mugu and Kalikot are
unfinished more than 20 years after they began to be built. A major
hindrance for those travelling on foot is the lack of footbridges to
cross the areas’ many rivers.
Radio
is the most important source of news about the outside world for the
Karnali people but many of them do not have a radio set. Although a
television transmitter was installed in Jumla in 2002, regular
transmission has yet to happen. Newspapers are not easily available and
those that are available are usually well out of date before they reach
the area. The telephone service is very limited and the postal service
unreliable. Food
crises are common. A disease epidemic and famine claimed hundreds of
lives in 1997 and 1998. One of the major causes of this has been the
central government's inefficient system for distributing subsidised rice
to the Karnali. Although elections have sent MPs from Karnali to sit in
the national parliament, the Karnali still suffers from a lack of
proper representation and access to policy making and central
government. The central government is responsible for planning the
area’s development, but has failed to properly carry out this task. The
people of Karnali have yet to see real democracy. It is money, and the
influence of friends and relatives that decides voters' choices. Anyway,
once elected many of the representatives move their homes away from the
Karnali either to a town in the Terai or to Kathmandu.
The
legal system also has little to offer the local people. They have
little trust in the official justice system and people from the northern
Karnali tend to settle their disputes locally. The main problems are
the very few lawyers who practice in Karnali, the courts being bogged
down with unsettled verdicts, and the inadequacy of the few qualified
lawyers.
Transparency is completely lacking in the way that government and non-government organizations operate in Karnali. This is due to the officials' self-cent redness, the lack of public
awareness about development issues, and the lack of any effective
monitoring and evaluation. The corrupt behavior of the people’s
representatives and government employees
is a serious problem. Corruption and mismanagement are widely
recognised as the factors most responsible for the delays in executing
the long -standing incomplete infrastructure projects. Local government
has been made largely ineffective by a host of factors. There is a lack
of efficiency and accountability whilst favouritism, nepotism and
corruption unduly influence decision making. The representatives lack
the required knowledge and often pose as members of the elite rather
than working to serve the masses. The system is also undermined by the
absence of autonomy, and the lack of monitoring and evaluation.
The Karnali-based civil servants are not motivated to deliver services to the people and hardly
any of the government’s local development staff ever visit the
villages. There is no clear system to manage, monitor and evaluate the
delivery of public services in Karnali. The Karnali people are proud to
be Nepali and point out that the Nepali language originated in their
area . The Nepali language played a crucial role in the unification of
Nepal. In spite of this they feel great bitterness that the central
government in Singha Durbar, Kathmandu has always neglected them. This
has fuelled a strong sense of regionalism. The Karnali Zone has very little access to and participation in the services provided by national and international organisations. Local citizens have struggled to carry out development activities through their own initiatives; but these efforts have met with little success due to a severe lack of resources.
Agriculture,
animal husbandry, and cottage industries – all of which depend on local
natural resources make up virtually all of Karnali’s economy. The
traditional technology, the often obsolete means of production, the
growing population, and the increasing attraction of modern lifestyles
have all adversely affected the standard of living in Karnali. Valuable medicinal and herbal plants such as yarchagumba, gucche mushroom,panchaunle,
and jatamashi are found in Karnali. But, this resource has not been
properly exploited. They are often not collected, stored or marketed
properly and little attention has been given to increasing their
production.The
Karnali people have been deprived of access to a good relevant
education. The difficult geographical terrain means that some students
have to walk two hours a day to reach their nearest school. The teachers
in government schools often remain absent from their posts.
Anyway the pressure of work at home prevents many students from attending classesregularly.
The main health problems in the Karnali are malnutrition, the lack of
awareness about hygiene, moking and drinking (alcohol), and the neglect
of women’s health. Health care provision is very poor with most
facilities lacking medicines and doctors.
Women
in Karnali are neglected and discriminated against from birth. Women
are forced to stay in cowshed s or caves whilst they are menstruating
and whilst delivering babies. Girls are often married off before they
reach puberty. The root causes of this neglect are the superstitious
traditional beliefs and parents' poverty and illiteracy. The locals are
guided by conservative beliefs and believe whatever the local preachers
say about the influence of the gods and evil spirits. These
superstitious beliefs influence many aspects of everyday life. The
Karnali people are mostly ignorant about Nepal’s constitution and laws
whilst the Karnali based government and non-government organisations
fail to uphold and monitor whether or not local people's human rights
are respected.
This
is the one zone of Nepal which is totally covered by the hill. There
are no facilities of transportation, proper education, health service,
electricity, water and sanitation, etc. Most of the people are fully
depend on the agriculture. In the karnali region lack of irrigation and
fertilizer land there is not enough production get by the farmer. As a
result they are bound to go India and demand to the government to
deliver the rice for karnali people. There is always start famine that
creates the problem for the nation to save the people from the die by
the famine. People are too much hard working but they are not able to
join to hand to mouth in all season. In this region famous for the
natural resources but lack of transportation and collection centre it’s
useless.
In
the education sector only few people are studying higher level
education. Most of the children are busy in the home work like care of
livestock, care of newly born child, help to mother, etc. Besides that
lack of income they are unable to get the higher education. There is no
quality education and English medium colleges which creates the problem
them to study higher level education. Now days there are establishes
colleges but the student are not come to study because geographical
difficulty. They can’t go to college in time which is far from the own
home it takes day long time so its not possible to go and come. There is
no science college for science student if you were got college you
can’t get the practical equipment so only in theoretical matters would
get. In this region difficult to get the educated people so all thing
also going on as a formality way not for the quality and capacity.
Many
people are die by the simple disease because there is no nursing home
and health care center only health post which handled by the CMA, HA,
and ANAMI so they are not knows about the disease and lack of equipment
people are die by the simple disease. In 5 districts 5 district health
offices in these offices also doctor less. Doctors are willing to sit
there by the lack of facilities and proper available equipment. Still
now people are believe in witch and religious matters. Political
leader are not responsible for development about the karnali region so
this region always backward in terms of development. local political
leaders are not able to hold the powerful position in the government as a
result they are only demanding right of karnali people but not able to
implementation it. Most of the political leaders also corrupt the budget
in local level and they are not think about the karnali people they
think about only own family.
In
the karnali region there are so many project established for the
purpose to reduce the unemployment, poverty, etc. But they are also work
in like as government agencies. Many INGOs/NGOs are withdraws budget
from the many institutions and government bodies but they are also
limited with the personal development. Karnali
region rich for natural resources if government gives the priority for
this region nation also can get the revenue from the karnali region.
It’s also area for tourist we can promote them by the proper management
of the historical places, Himalayas, lake, and national park.
