Lament of parched Madhesh

The winter was dry, and the monsoon has been drier, creating a crisis of potable water.

The local governors of the Rana era , called Bada Hakims and literally the Big Boss who ruled the district on behalf of the Maharaja in distant Kathmandu, chose to base their headquarters in Jaleshwar and so did the zonal overlords of the direct Shah rule . In the last decade of Panchayat, King Birendra ordered that the commissioner’s office be shifted to the zonal headquarters at Janakpur . A few Anchaladhises obliged the king but continued to reside and function from Jaleshwar even as they occasionally commuted to their formal office at Janakpur.