Joanna Lumley puts Nepal on the map

Joanna Lumley has rightly been lauded for her tireless efforts on behalf of Nepali Gurkhas. She has won a moral victory for those Nepalis who served in the British Army and now have the right to settle in the UK with their dependents, and with a pension commensurate with their “service”.

The star of AbFab is now also being feted in Nepal itself and is visiting Gurung and other communities who provide a high proportion of Gurkha recruits from the regions around and above Pokhara in the Annapurna Himal.

However Ms Lumley has done something else which many of us who work to help Nepal and some of the poorest children in the World have singularly failed to do; she has put Nepal on our TV screens and placed it “on the map”. During her recent visit she has been seen visiting a range of village communities, especially schools with relatively poor children who may have a school building, but not much to go in it. You know the sort of things …… books, pens, pencils …… teachers. Forget the computers, not much point without electricity! On a wider basis Nepal is one of the bottom 15 or so poorest countries in the World. Infant malnutrition is the HIGHEST in the World!!

So, thank you Joanna, we may just get a few more coins in the tin, or donations, or grants to help this impoverished (but deserving) country as a wider spinoff from your Gurkha campaign.