society and culture

#Ep.086 Mandakini is an international development consultant with more than 18 years of expertise in program design, development, and aid management in South Asia. She has managed complex regional programs in South Asia focused on sustainable development, with a strong understanding of governance systems, institutions, and political economy dynamics. In March of last year, she worked with The...

#Ep.065 The National Identity Card Project, an effort to digitize nationality through the distribution of a biometric-informed electronic card, began as part of Nepal’s e-Governance mission back in 2008. After years of delay, the NID is now in full swing, with almost 10.3 million individual data collected so far. Although the government initially touted the project for upholding Good Governance, m...

#Ep.062 २०७९ आषाढ देखी काठमाडौँमा शुरु भएको मिटर ब्याज तथा ठगी विरुद्धको किसानहरुको आन्दोलन काठमाडौँमा शुरु हुदा यसलाई कसैले गम्भीरताले लिएकै थिएनन् | पछि देशभरिबाटै मीटर ब्याजबाट पीडितहरु जुट्दै गएपछि बल्ल यसलाई सार्वजनिक सरोकारको मुद्दाको रुपमा हेरियो | आषाढमा शुरु भएको यो आन्दोलनका पिडितहरुसंग आश्विन २, २०७९ मा सरकारले ५ बुँदे सहमति गरेपछि मिटर ब्याज तथा ठगीविरुद्ध किसान मजदुर संघर्ष समितिले...

#Ep.060 Nepal is a multi-linguistic country with over 130 national languages recognized by the State. However, debates on multilingualism keep resurfacing, particularly concerning the State’s preference for khas kura (Nepali), a remnant of the Panchayat regime’s monolingual ‘Ek Desh, Ek Bhasa’ policy. The country has multilingual provisions, but the gaps within such provisions are quite visible; f...

#Ep.056 World Tiger Day 2022 was a special day for Nepal. The country announced that it had raised its tiger population to a solid 355, making it the frontrunner in tiger conservation in the world. Conservationists and big-cat enthusiasts worldwide were enthralled as the endangered feline population tripled from when it was last rounded up in 2009. In this episode, PEI colleague Dheeraj Gurung sit...

#Ep.045 मिडिया जनतालाई विश्वसनीय सुचना दिएर शुसुचित बनाउने माध्यम हो | तर आजको दिनमा नेपाली मिडियाको विश्वसनीयता माथि नै प्रश्न उठेका छन् | मिडिया हाउसहरु आफुलाई व्यवसायिक भन्छन् । तर व्यावसायिक रुपमा संगठित हुने नाममा त्यहाँ काम गर्ने पत्रकारहरुले राजनीतिक पार्टीका भ्रातृ संघठनका च्याप्टर खोलेका छन् , र त्यस अन्तर्गत चुनाव समेत लड्दछन् । यस्तो अवस्थामा ति मिडियाले प्रकाशित/प्रसारित गर्ने समाच...

In February 2020, just two months into the Covid-19 Pandemic, the World Health Organization announced another contagious threat to humans, an infodemic. They defined the phenomenon as ​​an excess of information, including false or misleading information, in digital and physical environments during a disease outbreak. Today, almost a year after the pandemic ceased, the infodemic persists. The glob...