शतवीज, प्लास्टिक र अन्नको बरबादी

पशुपतिनाथमा लाग्ने प्रमुख मेलाहरू मध्ये बालाचतुर्दशी प्रमुख हो । मेलाहरू मध्ये पनि यो मेला अलि फरक छ । रातभर पशुपति मन्दिर वरिपरि बत्ती बालेर र पूजा आराधना गरेर जाग्राम बस्ने र चतुर्दशीको दिन बिहानै शतवीज छर्ने चलन भएकोले पनि यो पर्व अन्य भन्दा फरक छ । सोही कारणले यसले सिर्जना गर्ने समस्या पनि फरक छ ।

आज बिहानै प्रभातकालिन विचरणको बहानाले पशुपति क्षेत्रतिर बरालिदा हिजोको बालाचतुर्दशीको पराकम्पन महसुस भयो । कैलाश डाँडामा चढ्ने सिँढी देखिनै शतविज भनेर छरिएको अनाज, उखुका टुक्रा, फलफुलका टुक्रा आदिले बाटो भरिभराउ थियो । लाग्छ सैयौं मुरी अनाज शिवजीको नाममा जमिनमा छरेर र कुल्चिएर नै बर्वाद भयो होला । पर्वको दिन बिहानै कार्यालय जाने बेलामा सडकका पेटी भरी थुप्रा का थुप्रा अनाज र फलफुलका मिश्रण देखिएका थिए । स्वाभाविक रूपमा ती सबै पशुपति क्षेत्रका चौर, जंगल, बाटो र सिंढिमा छरिए, शिबजीलाई खुशी पार्न, पितृ तार्न र आफ्नो परत्र सुधार गर्न ।

तर आज बिहानको दृष्यमा अनाज छरेको भन्दा पनि नरमाइलो देखियो । बाटो भरि, कैलाश डाडाको माथि मैदानभरि, सिढि भरि सर्वत्र प्लाष्टिक नै प्लाष्टिक । हजारौंको संख्यामा, पाइलो राख्ने ठाउँ सम्म पनि नहुने गरि प्लाष्टिक । पशुपतिको जात्राको यो परिणाम देख्दा शिवजीले पनि मन खिन्न पार्लान जस्तो लाग्यो । कपास खेतमा ढकमक्क कपास फुलेजस्तो चौरभरि सेता प्लाष्टिक र तिनका बीचमा खानेकुरा खोज्दै गरेका बेवारिसे बाच्छाहरू, प्लाष्टिकको सामान बटुल्दै गरेका दयनीय देखिने ठिटाहरु र त्यो अस्तव्यस्तताको बीच व्यायामको रूपमा प्रभातकालीव विचरणको लागि पाइलो राख्ने ठाउँ खोज्दै गरेका म जस्ता मानवहरू मिश्रित दृष्यले विचलित र दिक्क बनायो । सधै व्यायाम गर्ने र विचरण गर्नेहरूले भरिने चौर फोहोरले भरिँदा उदास लाग्नु स्वाभाविक नै हो ।

प्रश्न उठ्छ, के यस्तो हुनु जरुरी छ? के प्लाष्टिक बिना भजन, जाग्राम र पूजा सम्भव छैन? के पूजाको नाममा मुरीका मुरी अन्न मिल्काउन, कुल्चिन र नष्ट गर्न जरुरी छ ? के त्यो अन्न व्यवस्थित रूपमा कतै मन्दिरको नाममा नै अलग अलग  संकलन गरेर प्रयोग गर्न सकिंदैन? त्यही पशुपति क्षेत्रमा गाई संरक्षण आश्रम छ जसका संरक्षक गाईको दाना जुटाउन दशतिर भौंतारिन्छन् । वरिपरि हजारौंले छर्ने हजारौं किलो अन्न संकलन गरेर गाई आश्रमलाई दिन सकन्छ । राम्रो अन्न पशुपति क्षेत्रमै दिनहुँ चल्ने भोगमा वा वृद्धाश्रम, अनाथाश्रममा उपयोग गर्न सकिन्छ ।  त्यसै गरि प्लाष्टिकको सट्टा पुन: प्रयोग हुने झोला प्रयोग गर्न जनचेतना फैलाउन वा प्रतिबन्धित नै पनि गर्न सकिन्छ । यसो गर्दा पशुपतिनाथ पनि शतवीज छर्दा भन्दा अलि बढी नै खुशी होलान् कि ?

मंगलबार, १० मंसिर २०७६ (Tuesday 26 November 2019)

The Wealth Paradox

This evening I met a gentleman who is in a lucrative profession. Lucrative from my standpoint. Simply put, he makes around 5-10 times as much as I do. That does not mean my income is too paltry. I am making decent money for my profession as a job holder in a public organization. But, he is in a private enterprise and the profession itself is also considered very lucrative. 

As an leisurely talk, our discussion also wandered through many topics and also touched upon the subject of money, income and expenditure. He opined about not being very rich. From others' perspective, he is among the higher echelons of society in terms of wealth and income. A very well-furnished, spacious and fancily designed house, a mid-sized SUV, kids in high-end schools/colleges, he has a life to envy. Still, he said he was just getting along and there were people in his circle who were make wild amounts of money. He was amazed by their money-making skills. 

Here was a normal family man and an experienced professional earning a very good living. Still he talked about others being much richer than himself. I also regularly think that my house is not good enough, I do not have a car (I scrape along in buses, a normal scooter or sometimes in a vehicle of the office), my kids are in a middle-expenditure school/college and my shopping lists are generally curtailed by budget than fatigue. I have nurtured a desire to own a good DSLR for more than five years and am still to muster enough courage to buy one. I think at least ten times and postpone at least by six months before finally ordering a pair of new trousers. I am frugal but sometimes that frugality is the only option given the depth of my pocket. Still, there might be people who would kill to have my standard of living. They look up to me. I look up to that gentleman and even he looks up to someone else more wealthy than himself. 

Notion of wealth and income are paradoxical. On the one hand, wealth is just a means of living one's life. On the other, people run all their life after wealth, in all sorts of ways. Most people think a lot of money would make them happy. But there are people with a lot of money that are seeking happiness away from wealth. Is it related to the so called 'the other side is green' mentality? It may be. It may also be that human's desire for comfort, confidence and control is almost insatiable. The more of these things one gets, the requirement arises for even more. If no real requirement is there, the human mind convinces itself to seek more just for the sake of feeling more powerful, resourceful and better. 

So, if one has a decent life, if one does not need to seek others' help and kindness to live, if one can give his/her loved ones and children a decent living, education and future, the amount of wealth one possesses in terms of cash, goods, real estate, stocks etc are less important to make the life happy and worthwhile. 

09:55 PM, 17 November 2019

Planning Fallacy

It is not new to have an ambitious project taking more time than originally planned. Be it in telecom, civil infrastructure or any other form of planned and pre-defined activity with predefined schedule. Delays are common. Moreover, they are not specific to any low-income or so called less developed economies. Even advanced countries and economies tend to have their ambitious projects fall years, if not more, behind schedule.

Saw an interesting article in BBC today regarding this. Prominent mega projects such as Hong Kong to Zuhai bridge of china, Sydney Opera House of Australia, Berlin Airport of Germany far overshot their allotted time and also budget. Why are such delays so common and widespread. The BBC article talks about a phenomenon called 'Planning Fallacy'.

The article mentions that "The concept of the planning fallacy was first introduced by the Nobel Prize-winning psychologist and economist Daniel Kahneman and his collaborator Amos Tversky in the 1970s, who were inspired by the habits of their colleagues. They were surprised to note that their colleagues routinely underestimated how long a project would take to complete even after they had missed many deadlines on similar projects in the past. They weren’t learning from their errors."

It is further discussed that the prevalence of planning fallacy is much more common than commonly accepted. From minor household projects to multinational, multi-billion-dollar mega projects, the delays are seen everywhere. It is also seen in banal day to day activities such as shopping for festivities, filing tax returns, renewing licenses and submitting reports or manuscripts. Most are delayed beyond projected timeline or left to the last minute.

Another interesting concept being involved is called 'motivated reasoning' under which people tend to assume circumstances and situations that suit their purpose. This prompts them to assume that a particular activity shall be completed in less time and money than it ends up taking. It ends up taking more because the circumstances actually turn out to be different from anticipated as the anticipated situation was affected by 'motivated reasoning'.

While planning fallacy is so commonplace, researchers point out that the situation can be improved. One important key is the use of prior experience. Though the circumstances for each activity are subtly different from every other activity, the past experience can be used to consider more wider array of situations and factors affecting the planned activity, its timeline and budget. By applying proper use of experience in identifying and accounting for different factors affecting the activity, the error or deviation caused by 'Planning Fallacy' can be reduced.

Tuesday 05 November 2019 (19 Kartik 2076)

Envy - in Myths, Histories and Epics

Envy is a human trait. Moreover, it is a potent and very visible trait. It is often at the core of many incidents of struggle, conflict, death and destruction throughout history. No doubt it has been one of the favorite topics for storytellers, authors, poets. Naturally, it is also found as a driving factor of conflict, wars, struggle and family feud in many epics, irrespective of them being based on myth, historical events of even religious beliefs. 

Often, it is the people with a defeated mentality and a deficiency of some kind that are beset by envy for people around them. They envy those who have more wealth, power and physical ability. It is always the lesser that envies the better, at least in a specific trait. 

Dhritarastra of Mahabharat envied his brother Pandu as the latter was not blind, was more capable and was the rightful ruler. This envy was at the core of Dhritarastra continuing to envy his nephews, the Pandavas, even after Pandu died and Dhritarastra became the ruler. This deep rooted envy was the seed of the higher degree of envy and hatred among his sons against the Pandavas. That was the root cause of the whole war of the Mahabharat that resulted in total destruction of the most of the clan and its subjects. 

Ravana was envious of the beautiful wife of Ram and was tempted to kidnap her, resulting in the war and destruction of his beautiful kingdom. It was envy that led to untimely and dubious death of the monkey king Bali at the hands of Ram. Bali was envious of his brother Sugriva and his wife Tara. This festering envy led to the feud between the brothers and ultimately resulted in Bali getting killed at the behest of his own brother. 

Hitler was envious of the dominant position of Jews in the trade and industry in Germany and the rest of Europe. He considered himself an Aryan and superior to Jews but he also despised the Jews being so successful in trade, commerce, industry and other major aspects of society. He harbored this envy to such an extent that he manipulated the whole populace to perpetrate the holocaust on the Jews. He became the major cause of World War II and ended up being considered as one of the worst villains in history. 

Even in the modern times, the growing inequality in the world has given rise to higher level of envy between civilizations, populations and even states. As a result, a lot of extremism and radicalization has been seen emanating from different corners of the globe, both rich and poor. Neo-Nazism, anti-Semitism, far right or extreme leftist views, political radicalization, jihadism etc are all manifestation of some sort of envy harbored by one group against other group or groups. 

Hence, envy is at the core of human conflict, be it between siblings or between civilizations, be it between states or between ideologies, envy is the root of almost all worldly conflicts. If one were to goes by the scriptures and mythologies, envy is also paramount in heaven, among gods, demons and other mythical beings, Envy is an omnipresent phenomena blighting all cognizant beings or entities.