Nepal band cripples life across nation

KATHMANDU – Life has been affected in the Capital, Kathmandu, due to the shutdown enforced today by the Joint Struggle Committee for National Integrity and Ethnic Goodwill.

The banda or shutdown has been organized calling for enlisting the Kshetris, Brahmans, Dasnami, Sanyasis, Thakuris and Dalit caste groups in the list of indigenous nationalities.

A normal life in the capital city has been affected as educational institutions, public transport, factories and market are closed since the morning. However, essential services including ambulances, vehicles of foreign diplomatic missions and the media are allowed to operate.

The banda activists and organizers have descended to different places of the city as Naya Baneshwar, Koteshwar, Satdobato, Kalanki, Kalimati, Gongabu, Maharajgunj and Chabahil and are holding rallies chanting slogans. Police personnel in large numbers have been deployed at the main road crossings to prevent any untoward incidents during the banda.

Convenor of the Struggle Committee, Dil Bahadur Kshetri, said that the general strike has been organised to exert pressure for making the new Constitution acceptable to the people of all ethnicities and castes and based on equal treatment to all guaranteeing judicial rights.

The Struggle Committee comprises different caste-based organizations as the Kshetri Samaj Nepal, the Brahman Samaj Nepal, the Thakuri Samaj Nepal, the Dasnami Samaj, the Bibhed Mukti Pragatisheel Samaj, the Dalit Janajagaran Samaj, the Khas Kshetri Samaj and the Backward Classes Society, Nepal.

Similarly, life has been crippled in Chitwan, Bhadrapur, Biratnagar and Hetaunda since the morning due to the nation-wide general strike enforced by the Joint Struggle Committee as public transport, market and businesses remain shut. RSS